Law firm ordered to pay $3.1M to Las Vegas condo association – Las Vegas Review-Journal
"One of Nevada’s leading law firms not only enabled a criminal conspiracy but also participated in it, according to District Judge Mark Denton. Kummer Kaempfer Bonner Renshaw and Ferrario was so negligent it enabled contractor Leon Benzer to cheat a homeowners association out of $8 million. On Tuesday, Denton ordered the law firm now known as Kaempfer Crowell to pay $3.1 million to the Vistana Condominium Owners Association. The judgment is nearly $2.4 million; the rest is interest.
“The judgment could exceed $4 million after costs and attorneys’ fees are added,” said Vistana attorney Richard Haskin, although that’s up to the judge. Denton’s findings of negligence and breach of duty against Kummer Kaempfer were plentiful and brutal...
■ A young attorney named Brian Jones wasn’t supervised and allowed ballot stuffing in a HOA election.
■ The FBI told the law firm it was investigating Jones in connection with election irregularities, but no one at the firm informed Vistana.
■ The law firm represented both sides in suspicious HOA elections, a clear conflict of interest."
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This is, of course, another stage in the Leon Benzer, et al., HOA fraud ring scandal, the biggest white-collar crime case in the history of Las Vegas. Dozens of people incarcerated, many of them prominent individuals, including the former chair of the Nevada Republican Party. Several suicides. And what is at the bottom of it? The fact that many HOAs and condo associations are vulnerable to being manipulated or even taken over by unscrupulous professionals, officers, and board members, and used like ATMs.
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