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In Philadelphia, if a contractor gets their license revoked, they can simply start a new company and keep working. NBC10 investigative reporter Claudia Vargas reports on a business that was created that’s referred to as an “alter ego.”

One morning in late August, Elaine Thomas answered the knock on her North Philly home. It was a worker telling her a crew was getting ready to build a house next to hers.

"He said, ‘Ma'am I'm going to knock the side alley down,’" the 86-year-old homeowner recalled, referring to the shared covered alleyway between her home and the lot next to it.

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Later that morning, the right wall of her home came crashing down , with much of her furniture ending up

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