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FLORIDA RECORD

Thursday, March 28, 2024

Defendants ask judge to throw out third try at class action by Haines City 55-plus mobile home park residents

Federal Court
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U.S. District Court Judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell | law.ufl.edu/

TAMPA – Defendants facing fraud and conspiracy charges have asked a federal judge to throw out a third try at a racketeering class action against the owners and legal representation of a Haines City 55-plus mobile home park.

In their 19-page motion to dismiss filed March 19, Sun Communities Regional Operations & Sales Vice President Monica Slider of Orlando and other defendants allege the plaintiffs didn't follow the judge's order in February allowing them to file a second amended complaint.

The plaintiffs have not filed their Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) claims in a manner that complies with court-mandated "plausibility test" rule, the motion said.


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"Instead, they once again use a shotgun approach," the motion said, referring to the original and first amended complaints. "Defendants are still lumped together, the alleged misconduct of one undifferentiated from the misconduct of the others, with no requisite specification."

Claims in the second amended complaint are not limited to "a single set of circumstances" and "is no more organized than the two prior complaints – it is just shortened," the motion said.

"Plaintiffs did not get down to the nitty-gritty of alleging precise, plausible fraud-based RICO claims," the motion continued. "The court is again left to sift through the tangled, often incomprehensible allegations in an attempt to separate the meritorious claims from the unmeritorious. And the tangle hampers defendants' ability to isolate and specifically address the deficiencies."

Other named defendants in the case are Sun Communities Division Sales and Operations Vice President Sheri Woodworth of Southfield, Michigan and Park Manager Belinda Lawson, who also lives in Royal Palm Village in Haines City. Plaintiffs also are suing a law firm and an attorney who represented the owners.

Plaintiff Royal Palm Village Residents Inc. claims to be an incorporated mobile home owner association that represents more than 400 current and former elderly mobile home owners in the mobile home park on US Highway 17-92 West in Haines City. In their 108-page, eight-count original complaint filed in April of last year, the plaintiffs claimed to have suffered "fraudulent and conspiratorial acts" for several years used "to illegally and unreasonably deceive" mobile home owners.

The plaintiffs also claimed in their original complaint that defendants in the case "acted and conspired to circumvent statutory regulations under the Florida Mobile Home Act and engaged in further deceit and extortion."

The complaint was filed under the RICO statute in addition to state and common laws.

Among other things, plaintiffs claim the defendants passed on increased ad valorem, annual fire and storm water taxes to the mobile home owners, and "deceived and compelled" owners into "an oppressive and illegal five-year lot rental agreement."

Plaintiffs have been seeking a declaratory judgment that the defendants' alleged conduct violates federal and Florida laws, in addition to treble and punitive damages, and attorneys' fees and costs for themselves and each member of the class.

The original complaint was dismissed sua sponte, according to the nine-page order issued Feb. 21 by U.S. District Court Judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell, on the bench in Florida's Middle District. Honeywell granted dismissal of the original complaint because, among other things, "it was a shotgun pleading."

Honeywell also noted "the incorporation of lengthy statutory background, legal conclusions, and narrative fell short" of court rule requirements "and resulted in a confusing, vague and incomprehensible pleading," the February order said.

"In addition, the complaint impermissibly failed to give defendants fair notice by lumping them together in various stated causes of action," the February order said. "The complaint also impermissibly set forth causes of action that each relied on multiple statutory bases."

Honeywell's February order noted similar deficiencies in the first amended complaint and granted a defense motion for dismissal. Honeywell gave plaintiffs 14 days to file their second amended complaint to correct deficiencies that Honeywell noted in the case.

Honeywell also declined to certify a class in the case.

The 37-page second amended complaint, filed March 6, is no better, according to the latest defense motion to dismiss.

"Plaintiffs cannot alchemize a stipulated fact into a contradictory allegation to avoid dismissal," the motion said. "There is no 'mail or wire fraud' RICO claim stated in this third complaint because, at the end of the day, plaintiffs left the 'racketeering' out of RICO. They left out the racketeering because the left out the 'fraud' in mail and wire fraud. Without fraud, no mail or wire fraud is stated. Without mail or wire fraud, no racketeering is stated. Without racketeering, no RICO is stated. Thirty-seven pages of allegations, no fraud."

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