On October 18, 2018, the Law Offices of Kyle Todd filed suit on behalf of an African-American family against the operators of Harbor Village Apartments in Harbor City, California. The family is suing for racial discrimination and harassment on behalf of plaintiffs Virendia Reed and her two sons, ages 8 and 16. The complete list of defendants are: Related Management Co., L.P., RCMP Management, Inc., Harbor Village Housing Partners, L.P., Harbor Village Development Co., LLC, La Cienega Lomod, Inc., and TransPacific Management Service.
The suit alleges racial discrimination and harassment against Reed and her children, all African-American, by the security and staff at Harbor Village Apartments. From June 2017 to present, the lawsuit alleges, Reed and her children have been the target of racial discrimination and harassment by the apartment security, receiving approximately 16 write-ups for loitering and excessive noise. Some write-ups were issued when Reed and her children were not even present on the property. Some notices were issued to her son, who is 8 years old.
Additionally, around July 2017, the lawsuit alleges the apartment security denied Reed and her children access to the property because Reed was using a rental vehicle. As a result, Reed and her family claim they were victims of a gang shooting that took by in the street in front of the apartment complex. They now receive counseling for anxiety, stress, sleeplessness, and related emotional distress as a result of this traumatic experience.
Reed claims she and hers is not the only African-American family affected by the defendants’ racial discrimination and harassment, and that others have experienced similar harassment by the apartment security. Some African-American residents have moved out of the apartment complex, which Reed says was Harbor Village Apartments’ goal -- to harass and target African-American tenants until they are forced to leave.
Racial discrimination, particularly against African-Americans, has been in the news spotlight in the recent years: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2018/06/30/a-white-woman-called-police-on-a-black-12-year-old-for-mowing-grass/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.6b94ac4db944 and https://www.cnn.com/videos/us/2018/07/01/permit-patty-phone-call-release-vpx.hln.
“One’s home should be a safe space for private refuge, familial bonds,” says Todd. “For Reed and her family, as well as other African American families of Harbor Village Apartments, home has become a racist nightmare, fraught with profiling, harassment, and petty ticketing. This nightmare needs to end now.”
CONTACTS:
Law Offices of Kyle Todd
Kyle Todd
Attorney at Law
Tel: 323-208-9171 ext. 719
Law Offices of Kyle Todd
Mimi Li
Legal Assistant
Tel: 323-208-9171 ext. 721
