Legal Writes

Fatal Fire Lawsuit Heads To Trial

by | May 10, 2024 2:00 pm | Comments (14)

Laura Glesby Photo

Clarice Elarabi (pictured) is suing the city for the death of her brother, chef and gardener Michael Randall, in a 2019 illegal rooming house fire on West St.

Clarice Elarabi woke up at 3:12 a.m. feeling just so hot. Like, on fire.” 

She stuck her head out of the window. She took a cold shower. She tried and failed to go back to sleep. I was so hot,” she said, I didn’t know what was going on with me.”

Two hours later, Elarabi learned that her twin brother’s house in the Hill had erupted into flames.

The blaze took his life. It hurled her into life-altering grief. And Elarabi is now preparing to argue in court that the City of New Haven could have prevented it.

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Another Day, Another Ocean Tenants Union

by | May 9, 2024 2:00 pm | Comments (18)

Fair Rent's Wildaliz Bermúdez with new tenants union rep Zach Postle.

A cracked window at 1455 State.

Zach Postle and his neighbors got tired of waiting days and weeks and months for their landlord to respond to maintenance concerns like broken windows and busted heating, so they formed a tenants union — the sixth to officially file with City Hall, and the fifth created at an Ocean Management rental property.

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Yalies Walk, For Now

by | May 8, 2024 12:35 pm | Comments (27)

Thomas Breen photo

Yale senior Craig Birckhead-Morton and attorney David Grudberg in court Wednesday.

Donning keffiyehs and blouses and dress shirts and the occasional suit and tie, nearly 50 Yale students took their turns appearing before a state judge to face criminal trespassing charges stemming from their arrests at recent pro-Palestinian protests on campus.

The judge continued each case until dates in July or August, taking care to accommodate students’ summer break schedules when determining whether each should return in person or online.

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Warrant: Arrested Protester Lowered American Flag

by | May 1, 2024 4:02 pm | Comments (21)

Thomas Breen photo

The Beinecke Plaza flagpole on Wednesday.

A Yale graduate student allegedly spent 23 minutes working to release the rope and lower the American flag in Beinecke Plaza during the first night of a pro-Palestinian tent encampment.

A week later Yale police arrested that graduate student for vandalizing university property — with repair costs for the damaged” flagpole estimated at more than $9,100.

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Re-Entry Financial Literacy Study Launched

by | May 1, 2024 9:14 am | Comments (4)

Laura Glesby PHoto

Eric Providence of Columbus House, one of the project's advisors, recalled coming home from prison over two decades ago and "knocking on doors" closed shut in an effort to rebuild his life.

A new Yale study will provide one-on-one financial guidance to 238 New Haveners transitioning out of prison, while advocating for longer-term change to reduce poverty among formerly incarcerated people.

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WWJD: Evict Tenants Union Organizers?

by | Apr 30, 2024 3:32 pm | Comments (13)

Thomas Breen photo

Kolokotronis and Blau in Kolokotronis's city-condemned apartment.

The property manager of a church-owned apartment complex on Orange Street has ordered the two lead organizers of the building’s tenants union to move out or face eviction — from city-condemned rental units that they haven’t been able to live in for months.

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Judge OKs Migrant Workers' Eviction

by | Apr 17, 2024 2:07 pm | Comments (7)

Edgar Becerra and Josue Mauricio Arana in court.

Laura Glesby Photo

Edgar Becerra protests his former employer, MDF Painting and Power Washing, before the eviction proceedings.

A judge has ruled that Edgar Becerra and Josue Mauricio Arana must find a new place to live, ending an eviction case that sparked protests over alleged exploitation of migrant workers.

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Sex Offender Finds Millions, Keeps Yeshiva

by | Apr 17, 2024 10:36 am | Comments (11)

Thomas Breen photo

The Edgewood Yeshiva, no longer in foreclosure.

Christopher Peak file photo

Rabbi Greer: Signs mortgage docs and runs nonprofits while behind bars.

Incarcerated sex offender Rabbi Daniel Greer’s nonprofit housing organizations received a $12 million boost from a mystery lender — and then saw two longstanding lawsuits ditched by Greer’s sexual-abuse victim.

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Driver Arrested In 2023 Fatal Hit & Run

by | Apr 10, 2024 8:51 pm | Comments (4)

Chief Jacobson (right) alongside Rodriguez's family.

Contributed photo

The late José Rodríguez.

Amidst a cloud of smoke” and doubled-parked cars, a 19-year-old driver named Dajon Marques Morris struck and fatally injured a 41-year-old motorcyclist named José Rodríguez in Fair Haven.

Morris then panicked” and, fearing for his life,” fled the scene — only to be arrested by city cops roughly 10 months later.

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