Eviction of two men blocked by JP

Jace Radke

Tuesday, April 9, 2002 | 10:41 a.m.

Two men alleging that an apartment complex manager wants them out because they are black will not be evicted from low-income housing in downtown Las Vegas, a justice of the peace ruled today.

David Johnson and Franklin Chavis will keep their residences in the Bonanza Spring Apartments, 600 E. Bonanza Road, after Justice of the Peace Deborah Lippis' decision this morning. Apartment manager R.C. Barry did not appear.

"I'm not surprised that he didn't show up," Johnson said. "I've never said anything bad about the man, but we still have this harassment."

Barry's failure to show up "is further indication that these actions are harassment rather than anything substantive," said American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Allen Lichtenstein, who represented the pair. "These are poor people who can't hire lawyers, and the idea is to scare or chase them out."

Chavis, a wheelchair-bound resident, said he was given a third-floor apartment despite the fact that vacant units were available on the first floor, and Johnson said that management tried to force him to give up his first-floor poolside apartment for one near U.S. 95 or Bonanza Road.

Lichtenstein said he would send someone today to pay Johnson's April rent, which he said Barry had refused to accept.

Barry last week denied the claims of racism, and said that the moving of residents from the first floor is part of a new policy at the complex to locate weekly renters on the first floor and monthly renters on the second and third floors.

Barry said that he has tried to talk to Johnson about moving to another of the 148 furnished apartments at the complex.

Johnson, who has lived at the the complex since 1999, said Barry has refused to repair leaks in his ceiling, and that his guests and friends are shooed off the property by security.