NEW KENT COUNTY, Va. -- A big win in a discrimination case based out of New Kent County has lawyers encouraging residents to seek help if they feel like they're being targeted by their landlord.
According to a recently settled lawsuit filed in Richmond's Federal District Courthouse, Ronald Maybush and his granddaughter "KM," who is said to be a "mixed race" minor in the filing, faced blatant discrimination from the owner of the mobile home park they lived in at the time and the park's employees.
The lawsuit alleges in 2019, an employee of the mobile home park, Putze's Mobile Home Park, referred to KM with racial slurs using the N-word, and told her she needed to "go last" when boarding her school bus because of her race. The suit also alleges the same employee encouraged her dog to attack KM.
The suit says Maybush, who is the legal guardian of KM, was able to move out of the mobile home park in April 2020 due to ongoing discrimination but alleges the mobile home park's landlord tried to "block" any attempts at a sale of the mobile home and also filed an Unlawful Detainer against the plaintiffs a few months later.
CBS6 reached out to the defendants' counsel for comment on the case and did not hear back.
In November, both parties reached a settlement, with the defendants paying $22,500 in funds to be held in an account to benefit KM's education.
Due to a clause in the lawsuit, Maybush could not speak with CBS6 on camera. However, his attorney Brenda Castaneda, shared that these kinds of cases happen more often than most people expect.
"I think there's kind of a misconception that this kind of direct discrimination is a thing of the past," Castaneda said. "It's definitely not."
Castaneda is Deputy Director of Advocacy for Housing Opportunities Made Equal, also known as HOME. The group investigates Fair Housing Act complaints and violations.
"The Fair Housing Act is very broad, and it covers housing service providers, so it could be, in addition to your landlord, it could be a utility that is failing to provide service to people, maybe asking for certain kinds of ID that they don't have," Castaneda explained. "The Fair Housing Act says that people can't do that on the basis of a protected class, so that's on the basis of race, color, religion, elderliness, military status, whether or not you have minor children. Disability is a big one we see a lot."
Castaneda said landlords have a responsibility to act on any kind of reports of discrimination that may come up.
"The landlord has some duty to try to prevent harassment of tenants once they know what's going on," Castaneda said. "If it's happening due to other tenants or employees or agents of the landlord, they actually have a duty to do something about it. They can't say, 'Well it wasn't me so I don't need to address this.'"
She suggested reaching out for advice from HOME if you think you may have faced a violation of the Fair Housing Act.
“You may not have a physical issue, it’s not a car accident, but there’s harm that happens to people, there’s psychological harm and dignitary harm, and you can get compensation for that," Castaneda said.
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