Victims, families sue over shooting at Haverstock Hill

Plaintiffs seek over $1 million in damages

A lawsuit filed Friday against the owners and managers of a northeast Houston apartment complex where a March shooting took place alleges that the residential community did not have adequate security, according to court documents.

The latest legal action follows a shooting on March 26 at the complex, Haverstock Hill, that left two dead and four, including a former “America’s Next Top Model” contestant, injured.

Four family members and three people injured in the gunfire are suing the owners of Haverstock Hill, Equality Community Housing, and the company that manages the property, J. Allen Management Company, for gross negligence, according to court documents.

They are asking for more than $1,000,000 in damages, said the lead attorney on the case, Benny Agosto, Jr., partner at the law firm Abraham Watkins. The two companies declined to respond to requests for comment.

The lawsuit accuses both companies of putting residents at the complex at 5619 Aldine Bender Road at risk for injury.

Neither company adequately secured the complex, despite a history of gang violence in the area and on the premises, according to the lawsuit. Both companies also failed to respond to the 30-minute dispute at Haverstock before it escalated into a fatal shooting, the lawsuit alleges.

The suit was filed on behalf of the mothers of the two men who died in the gunfire at Haverstock, 33-year-old Christopher

Beatty and 31-year-old Wayne Rusher; the two mothers of Wayne Rusher’s four children; and three of the four people who were injured during the shooting, 47-year-old Arthur Larkin, 28-year-old Isaiah Rusher and 32-year-old Brandy Rusher, the former “Top Model” contestant.

It comes days after the accused gunman, 35-yearold Harvey Jones, was arrested in Jacksonville, Fla.

Jones was charged with capital murder in March. Jones’ brother who was at the complex with him that day, 34-year-old Harvey Jones, was charged with aggravated assault in March. He turned himself in to authorities shortly after.

Haverstock Hill has had a reputation for decades as a crime-ridden apartment complex. In 2010, it was the site of the first gang injunction in Harris County. The injunction banned known members of the Bloods and the Crips street gangs from the premises and surrounding businesses and schools.

The 2010 injunction was expanded in 2014.

The lawsuit points toward the complex’s open gates, unmanned security station and lack of working security cameras as evidence of negligence on behalf of the owners and management companies.

Since the March 26 shooting, the companies have demolished the unmanned security station to make way for a secure gate.

The sole person injured in the shooting who is not included in the suit is 16-year-old Ty’bra Baptiste. Agosto said he was unsure if she planned to file a separate suit.