Landlords Fight Back by Suing Santa Ana, Tenants’ Groups

Several Santa Ana landlords, angered by a protracted rent strike and pressure from city officials to improve their properties, have filed separate lawsuits in federal court, claiming that their civil rights have been violated by the City of Santa Ana and several tenants’ rights groups.

“Landlords have been pretty ticked off about what’s been happening over the past two years,” said Bruce A. Carr, an attorney representing about half a dozen property owners.

“We feel the city has been much too sympathetic to the tenants, to the detriment of the landlords.”

Carr said the landlords he represents have not computed a total out-of-pocket loss from the rent strike, but it involves a substantial amount of money.

Since 1984, the Santa Ana officials have been cracking down on substandard housing, filing civil and criminal charges against apartment landlords for building code violations that include exposed wiring, broken plumbing and cockroach infestations.

In response to the crackdown, hundreds of low-income families have withheld rent to protest alleged substandard living conditions and threats of eviction resulting from landlord claims that the apartments are overcrowded.

Instead of fighting individually, Carr said, the landlords have banded together. They are suing the City of Santa Ana, the Legal Aid Society of Orange County and Hermandad Mexicana Nacional, an immigrants’ rights organization that aids striking tenants, according to the complaints filed in federal court here.

Carr said that he had filed three suits so far and that several other landlords plan to file similar complaints in state and federal court. The lawsuits seek to stop the “selective enforcement of building codes” and prevent the city from filing civil and criminal charges against the landlords.

Santa Ana officials could not be reached for comment.

One lawsuit filed Friday was by James and Bonnie Isbill of Orange, owners of an apartment building on East Washington Street. They are seeking $2 million in damages from the city and the other defendants.

In 1985, the city ordered the Isbills to make several improvements to their property, according to the suit. The Isbills applied for city building permits for the work, but, the lawsuit alleges, the permits were not issued fast enough for the Isbills to make the improvements within the 120-day limit set by the city.

The city subsequently filed civil and criminal complaints against the couple, some of which have been settled, according to Carr.

“The sum total of things has really drained him (Isbill),” Carr said.

Last week, Carr filed a lawsuit against the city on behalf of Carmine Esposito, a Santa Ana landlord previously charged with 70 misdemeanor counts relating to conditions at his West Brook Street apartments. In October, 1985, Esposito was ordered to pay a $70,000 settlement after pleading guilty to one count of violating the city’s uniform housing code.