The Kabateck LLP trial team, led by Brian Kabateck with the support of senior associate Shant Karnikian, secured a landmark $57 million settlement providing transformational compensation to hundreds of low-income Southern California mobile home park residents who now have the means to relocate into safer living conditions.
Kabateck LLP obtained a settlement of a mobile home habitability lawsuit for over $57 million, which is the largest settlement ever involving a mobile home park.
In a case filed in 2015, captioned “Acosta, et al. v. City of Long Beach,” Kabateck LLP represents approximately 150 families residing at the Friendly Village Mobile Home Park in Long Beach, CA. The lawsuit alleged claims against the owners and managers of Friendly Village Mobile Home Park for the failure to maintain the Park. The site where the Park is located was used as a trash dump in the 1940s and was closed around 1945. The residents—who own the homes but rent the land and utilities—alleged that the land is constantly shifting and sinking, thereby damaging their homes and the utilities. The residents also alleged that by failing to remediate the issues with the sinking land, the owners of the park allowed the park to devolve into uninhabitable conditions while charging increasingly exorbitant rents.
After an eleven-week jury trial ending in November of 2018—in what was supposed to be a series of trials—the Kabateck LLP trial team led by Brian Kabateck and Shant Karnikian obtained a jury verdict of $39.7 million on behalf of the first 31 families.
A year later, Brian Kabateck negotiated a global settlement valued at over $57 million for all 350 Friendly Village Mobile Home Park residents. The settlement included monetary compensation paid immediately by the owners of the park, and a portion of the proceeds from the pending sale of the park. This historic agreement resolves years of fierce litigation by Kabateck LLP and is the largest settlement of a mobile home habitability lawsuit in the nation’s history.