A man who was being forced out of his home in Texas committed suicide this week, and in a note that authorities found after the his death, the man blamed everything on Rams owner Stan Kroenke.
Police told KFDX-TV in Texas that the first line of Rick Ellis' suicide note said, "Stan you took my home."
Ellis was a resident of Wichita County, Texas, which happens to be the home of Kroenke's biggest land purchase of 2016: The W.T. Waggoner Estate Ranch, which consists of roughly 520,000 acres.
Kroenke bought the land in February for a nine-figure price. Although it's not known exactly what he paid, the ranch had been on the market for $725 million. The 520,000 acres that Kroenke bought made him the owner of a chunk of land that's bigger than Los Angeles and New York City combined, or in other words, it's roughly half the size of Rhode Island.
When Kroenke purchased the land, the acreage included several homes near a lake. In early August, Kroenke's company sent a letter to each resident letting them know that they were being evicted and had to be off the land by Jan. 31, 2017.
Ellis couldn't afford to move, and that's what led to his suicide, according to his wife, Annette. Ellis had gone missing on Oct. 26, and police later found his body near a river on Oct. 28.
"The very first line of his suicide note was 'Stan stole my home,'" Annette told KMOV-TV in St. Louis. "[Stan] is an evil, evil man. My husband was worth more than all of your money, Stan. The love he gave me. The life we lived. We worked together, we were best friends... we were never apart."
According to Annette, most of the residents who are being kicked out of their homes are elderly people who can't afford to move.
"[Stan] knew none of us had the money to fight him in court, he knew, and you know what? He didn't give a dang care in the world and that's really the sad part about this, that there's a human being that just doesn't care," Annette said.
One of Ellis' neighbors, Rick Smith, said he wasn't surprised to find out what happened to Ellis.
"I did expect something like this to happen," Smith told KFDX-TV. "And I do believe this is not the last tragic news we're going to hear, because there are elderly, disabled people out there that have no where to go and no money to do anything with and are going to turn to that option."
According to Smith, Ellis didn't leave his wife with much.
"It's going to be very tough for her," Smith said of Annette. "He didn't have any insurance, she doesn't have the money for burial expenses. She doesn't have the money to move. She doesn't have the money to do anything. She's just at an impasse where she doesn't know what she's going to do from day to day."
The vice president of the homeowner's association in Ellis' area, Kelly Sadler, expressed her disappointment in Kroenke.
"It's sad that people like Stan do not even think of the consequences of making a buck at the expenses of others," Sadler said. "At what point do you say enough. Rick was a nice caring southern man trying to live in peace."
Rick Ellis was 61.