Castillo v. Nathan Korman
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Sending a strong message to landlords, a Los Angeles
jury ordered the owners of a Hollywood apartment building
to pay nearly $6 million Wednesday to a 9-year-old boy
who was severely burned trying to warm his hands on
the open flame of a gas stove because the apartment’s
heater did not work.
 The
jury of eight women and four men decided that Nathan
Korman and Korman Center Enterprises should pay $2.5
in general damages plus $3.3 million in punitive damages
for failing to provide heating in the family’s
$600-a-month apartment.
“I just want to tell landlords to care about
tenants like you care about your mother and father,”
said Endria Castillo, a county parks worker and mother
of Quantez, the injured boy. “I’m sure it
would have been a whole lot cheaper” to repair
the building’s heating units.
Quantez, dressed in a white button-down shirt, fidgeted
as he sat at the counsel table with his lawyer, Garo
Mardirossian. The verdict was returned in the downtown
courtroom of Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge
Lee Smalley Edmon.
Outside court, a female alternate juror hugged Castillo.
Juror Mike Goodrich of San Gabriel said Korman had
disregarded his legal responsibility to provide heat
for his low-income tenants. “He knew what the
law was,” Goodrich said. “He just didn’t
want to obey it. It was just a shame that something
like that happened.”
Korman, who plaintiffs say owns 12 apartment buildings
in and around Los Angeles, was not in court Wednesday.
His attorney, Russell Wollman, said, “We are
disappointed by the verdict,” but declined to
say if the case would be appealed.
Mardirossian said the jury’s message to landlords
was clear: “Their first and foremost responsibility
is to those tenants . . . They’ve got to have
heat. They’ve got to have water. They’ve
got to have electricity.”
Castillo moved with her two boys into Korman’s
building at 1002 N. Mariposa Ave. in July 2000 and soon
learned that the wall heater was not connected to the
gas line, according to Mardirossian’s trial papers.
She complained a few times and a handyman was sent
out but, according to Castillo, the heater never worked.
Without a fireplace, Castillo heated her family’s
cold and drafty apartment by turning on the burners
of the gas stove, Mardirossian said. She could not afford
to buy a space heater on the money she brought home
– less than $1,000 a month, he said.
Then, four days before Christmas 2000, Quantez woke
up in the middle of the night and went into the kitchen
for a glass of water, the lawsuit said.
With the outside temperature dropping into the 40s,
the then 6-year-old stopped by the lighted stove to
warm his hands, plaintiffs said. His pajamas ignited
and the boy suffered third-degree burns to his right
arm, shoulder and back.
Quantez’s injuries were not visible through his
long-sleeve shirt, but his attorney said the boy would
require years of treatment. His mother said he is still
a smart and happy child but he is “more self-conscious,”
noticing when people stare at him.
The jury initially awarded the boy $3.2 million in
general damages, but reduced that to reflect the carelessness
of others.
The fourth-grader, who dreams of playing football and
going to UCLA, said he wanted to use the money to buy
video games, a go-kart and a Chevy Tahoe for his 6-year-old
brother, Elmer. He also said his mother had talked of
buying a home “in, like, Culver City.” |
