High-stakes Ghost Ship civil lawsuit to proceed
The state Supreme Court has refused to protect the city of Oakland from a high-stakes civil lawsuit filed by the families of Ghost Ship fire victims, leaving the city potentially liable for deaths of 36 partygoers and other damages.
The high court on Wednesday denied the city’s petition seeking a review of Alameda County Judge Brad Seligman’s ruling that Oakland had a duty to ensure safety at the Fruitvale dis- trict warehouse. The ruling allows the lawsuit to proceed.
More than 80 plaintiffs have sued Oakland, Pacific Gas and Electric Co. and the building’s landlord, alleging officials were aware of electrical dangers at the warehouse and failed to keep the building safe. A state appellate court earlier refused to hear the city’s case.
Attorneys for the victim families plan to begin taking depositions of city employees, including police officers and firefighters who had been inside the Ghost Ship before the deadly Dec. 2, 2016 inferno. Despite numerous visits, the building was never inspected and people continued to live there even though it was zoned for commercial use.
The city had argued the visits should be considered inspections and protected under an immunity clause shielding workers doing inspections from civil liability. In May, Seligman, ruled Oakland had a “mandatory duty” to keep the warehouse safe.
In August, Seligman dropped the city of Oakland as a defendant from a lawsuit over the March 27, 2017 fire at a San Pablo Avenue halfway house in which four people were killed. He noted key differences between the two cases, notably that firefighters did perform an inspection days before the San Pablo Avenue blaze.
“Unlike the Ghost Ship case, where there was no inspection and the city was clearly on notice of the unsafe conditions from non-inspection activities, here there undeniably was an inspection and it addressed the same
types of matters as the earlier incidents,” he wrote.
Thomas Brandi, an attorney for the victim families, said the city should have “simply complied with the mandatory duties imposed on them.”
“We believe at the end of the day, the evidence will establish the city of Oakland is responsible for this preventative, horrific tragedy,” Brandi said.
The Ghost Ship lawsuit also names master tenant Derick Almena, co-tenant Max Harris and landlord Chor Ng and her two children as defendants. Almena and Harris are the only people charged criminally for the fire. Each man has been charged with 36 counts of involuntary manslaughter and are scheduled for trial next year.
The civil trial is tentatively scheduled to begin in October 2019, if it is not settled first. A spokesman for the Oakland City Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.