Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Property management company failed to repair mold from 2014. In addition, company took excessive amount of deposit. Company admitted to existence of mold multiple times, documented with video, phone log, and photographs. Company admitted to over charging deposit, due to company oversight. Company is willing to issue small fraction (under $300) for total compensation. Company claims I am extorting them by requesting hight amount of funds. In addition, I feel it necessary to go public with this situation due to multiple people being exposed to the mold, property management company claims this too is extortion. Need help, afraid to continue due to bullies; would hate to give up my rights out of fear. But I also do not want to be accused of a crime for going public with this health concern. We estimate the damages to be around 16K, but wanted to stay in small claims, so reduced that to 10K. Need advice on how to move forward and if this can puts me at risk for jail or heavy backlash. Thank you for your time.


Asked on 9/30/16, 2:16 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys

If you told them you would go public if you did not receive more than they are offering, you committed extortion. Not likely to get prosecuted, much less jail time, under the circumstances you describe, but you certainly put yourself in a bad position by doing that. As for what you can do, as we lawyers say "you can't un-ring a bell." Filing and prosecuting a law suit is never extortion, but threatening to make embarrassing information public is and it may well affect your civil case even if the DA couldn't care less about such a small matter. You need a lawyer to help you sort this out

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Answered on 10/01/16, 8:33 pm


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