The collapse of a condominium tower near Miami will set off years of litigation as victims and their families look to find fault among the building’s management as well as engineers, architects and others, according to legal experts.
Disaster struck in Surfside, Florida, on June 24 as a major repair project was beginning, although the cause of one of the worst residential construction failures in the United States is likely to have many contributing factors stretching back years.
“Whether it be architects, engineers or contractors that had any involvement in this building, we’ll be looking at everybody to hold each party responsible for their negligence,” said Daniel Wagner, a real estate lawyer in south Florida, who declined to say if he was representing anyone involved in the collapse.
But it will be a process complicated by finger-pointing and a trend in recent years in Florida law that has made it increasingly difficult to hold parties accountable for construction defects, lawyers said.
Liability in complex disasters often gets parcelled out among defendants, with a certain percentage being apportioned to each, legal experts said.
“It’s my professional opinion that everyone is going to blame everybody else,” Wagner said.
The death toll yesterday climbed to 32, and 117 were unaccounted for. Less than 24 hours after the collapse, the first of at least three lawsuits was filed against Champlain Towers South Condominium Association Inc, run by a volunteer board comprised of owners, for failing to ensure the building’s safety.
Bob McKee, a lawyer who brought a case on behalf of Steven Rosenthal, a resident who survived the collapse, said until another cause can be identified, the presumption is failed maintenance was to blame.
The condo association president warned residents in an April letter that the situation had “gotten significantly worse” since “major structural damage” was identified in a 2018 inspection. The president urged them to support a $15 million assessment for repairs while acknowledging the work “could have been done or planned for in years gone by.”
McKee said plaintiffs will identify other potentially liable parties through the discovery process. One lawsuit by the family of missing resident Harold Rosenberg also named as defendants Morabito Consultants and SD Architects for failing to warn residents of the danger of collapse.
The lawsuit blamed the Morabito engineering firm, which conducted the 2018 inspection, for allegedly failing to warn the condo association of the need to evacuate the building. The firm was retained again in 2020 and did not warn residents the damage it uncovered two years earlier had not been repaired, the lawsuit said. Morabito said in a statement that it provided its 2018 report and recommendations to the condo association. Rene Rocha, a Morgan & Morgan attorney working on the Rosenberg case, said informing the board may not have been enough.


Death toll 32 as Storm Elsa complicates search
Rescuers raced yesterday to search the site of a deadly condo tower collapse in Florida as Tropical Storm Elsa barreled closer, threatening the operation with torrential downpours and strong winds.
The death toll from the June 24 disaster in Surfside rose overnight to 32 as search teams found four more bodies in the rubble, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told reporters.
Twenty-six victims have been identified.
Levine Cava said 117 people are still listed as missing and the authorities have been able to confirm that 70 of that number were in the 12-storey building when it came tumbling down.
She said Tropical Storm Elsa was making the already “challenging and adverse conditions” faced by the search teams even more difficult.
“We’re closely monitoring the weather,” the mayor said.
Elsa, which has maximum winds of 60 miles per hour, is expected to near hurricane strength and make landfall on Florida’s west coast today morning.
The authorities warned residents to prepare for dangerous storm surge and possible power outages.
Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said the weather was impacting the search of the debris from the building known as Champlain Towers South.
“The wind is hampering the large cranes moving very heavy debris,” he said. “That’s a challenge they’re trying to work around right now.”
Miami-Dade County fire chief Alan Cominsky said the demolition Sunday night of the still standing portion of the building had allowed search teams to expand their operations.
Cominsky said 200 firefighters were “actively searching on the pile” with assistance from teams around the country and the world.
Cominsky said 124 tons of debris had been removed so far.
Burkett, the Surfside mayor, said engineers were conducting a “full structural review” of other tall buildings in the city including Champlain Towers North, a sister condo tower to the one that collapsed.
He said the authorities have “deep concerns about that building” and some residents have moved out.
Levine Cava said “numerous investigations” were underway looking into the reasons for the collapse.
“The whole world wants to know what happened here,” she said. “I look forward to learning the truth, as do we all.”
“It’s very early to name any sources but of course everything is under review,” she said.
Levine Cava expressed her concern for the families that are awaiting for news about their loved ones.
“We know that the waiting, and the waiting, and the waiting is unbearable,” Levine Cava said.
No survivors have been found since the day of the collapse.