Fouling of mansion sickens new owner

SADDLE RIVER, N.J. - The neighbor who bought a mansion later found to be littered with the feces of more than 100 cats and dogs living there wants out of the foreclosure deal.

"When I bid on that house, I was bidding on a home that I saw people living in. I saw people every day coming in and out of the house," Michael Acciardi, 47, told the Record of Bergen County for yesterday's newspapers. "I thought I was bidding on something habitable."

Philip and Cynthia Tamis have been charged with animal cruelty after authorities found the live animals and at least 23 dead animals in the couple's three-car garage.

A DHL delivery man alerted authorities Aug. 14 after smelling a horrible odor at the 20-room home and seeing animals scurrying inside. The delivery man was worried that someone had died.

Acciardi, who lives next door, paid $2.6 million for the house but never saw the interior. He was on vacation when police alerted him to its condition, and went inside for the first time Thursday.

"It was so bad inside that I became violently ill," Acciardi said. "Just the scent on my clothing - I had to go home and change."

He didn't become suspicious when Philip Tamis wouldn't let him in the house before the auction, he said, because the homeowner was a "private person."

Tamis, 66, said the house was fine, Acciardi said.

Animal-control officials said Friday that they were still looking for animals inside the home.

Piles of feces were found in every room, at least two inches of fecal matter covered the two tubs in the master suite, and pet food was littered around the house.

A lawyer for Tamis and Tamis' wife, 49, has said the couple lived in the mansion for about eight years and had a long history of taking in sick and abandoned animals.

But the lawyer, Santo Bonanno, said the Tamises had experienced severe financial hardship, had to sell their home, and "things just got out of hand."