Excerpt: It was a shock when Edward Peterson returned to his downturn apartment last week to discover that it was stripped of everything, including shelves and drawers.

An hour or so later, police discovered that his landlord had cleaned out the apartment by mistake.

According to a Madison police report, Peterson, 36, returned to his apartment at 121 S. Hancock St. on Feb. 20 at 3 p.m. and found it emptied of all his furniture and belongings. He had left just five hours earlier, and everything was fine.

Peterson flagged down Madison Police Officer Nicholas Ellis in his squad car at 3:40 and he followed Peterson to his apartment to investigate what he assumed was a burglary.

The supposed burglar turned out to be Peterson's landlord at Hart Rentals, who had instructed a maintenance worker to clean out Peterson's apartment by mistake. Shirley Eckes, business manager of Hart Rentals, told Officer Ellis that the company wanted to clean out an apartment with...