$1.3 Million Awarded in House Scam : Courts: Jury orders real estate investor to pay sum to family of an elderly man who was nearly conned out of his home.

A Los Angeles Superior Court jury Friday ordered a Rancho Palos Verdes real estate investor, who has been sued more than 100 times, to pay about $1.3 million in damages to the family of an elderly man whom the investor’s company tried to cheat out of his house.

Kevin S. Merritt, 31, who also is facing criminal charges because of his real estate transactions, was ordered to pay the judgment to the family of Roland Henry, an 85-year-old Watts man who died last year.

Henry signed over the deed of his house to Merritt’s company after company employees duped him into thinking he was signing papers for a home loan, said Stephen Owens, Henry’s attorney.

Merritt, whom the civil court jury found guilty of fraud and intentional infliction of emotional distress, was ordered to pay $1,336,350 to Henry’s family. Merritt’s former business partner, David Green, part owner of Beverly Hills Investment and Loan Assn., was also found guilty of fraud and ordered to pay an additional $37,900 to the family.

“There is nothing more vicious than to seek out the elderly and the illiterate--the most vulnerable elements of our society--and to intentionally defraud them out of their houses,” Owens said. “These people built a big business seeking out these kinds of people and victimizing them. . . . That is just an evil thing to do.”

For 30 years, Henry sold hand-made tamales on a street corner in Watts, and his late wife worked as a maid in Brentwood, Owens said. He paid off the mortgage to his modest two-bedroom house shortly before his death.

Henry began having financial problems after a series of health problems, including the loss of a leg and an eye and severe arthritis. He was bedridden when employees of Merritt’s firm had him sign papers in 1989 that he believed were for a home loan, Owens said.

But Henry, who had a sixth-grade education and could barely read, actually signed a grant deed to his home, Owens said.

Henry was able to keep his home through various court actions by Owens and attorneys for Public Counsel, a public interest law firm. But the strain of the legal struggle took its toll on Henry, said his sister, Canzata Castleberry, contributing to his death in February, 1991.

The district attorney’s office has filed 19 criminal charges against Merritt, including grand theft, recording a false or forged document, and fraud.

Neither Merritt nor Green could be reached for comment.

Rancho Palos Verdes