Tenants of Cedar Run Apartments, a Denver complex that was the site of a highly publicized immigration raid last month, filed a lawsuit against their landlord Monday alleging unsafe conditions.
A dozen residents, tenants’ union members and legal representatives gathered Monday morning in front of the property to announce the complaint filed in Denver County Court against Cedar Run Apartments and Apartment Management Consultants LLC. The complex, at 888 S. Oneida St., is owned by Gelt Venture Partners, which bought it in 2019.
In the gaggle was Luis Fernando Chacon Lopez, who alternated between speaking in Spanish and tending to the baby in his arms. In his unit at Cedar Run where he’s raised his son, Chacon Lopez said he has dealt with broken bathroom fixtures, a lack of running water and no heat for one month during the winter.
Then, on Feb. 5, the raid carried out by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal agencies took place, and Chacon Lopez’s brother was taken into custody, he said. An English translator for Chacon Lopez said his sibling hadn’t committed any crimes and was in the asylum process when he was detained.
“That’s why I’m here in protest,” Chacon Lopez said.
The lawsuit alleges problems — including vandalism, human waste and trespassers in common areas — caused by unsecured exterior doors to the complex’s residential buildings.
“Cedar Run Apartments are unsafe — not because of the race, language, or immigration status of its residents — but because of systematic failures by its landlord to maintain the premises in safe, habitable condition,” the lawsuit says.
Eida Altman is the director of the Denver Metro Tenants Union, an organization that uses its collective membership to advocate for tenants’ rights. She said Cedar Run residents had also been forced to handle challenges like destroyed mailboxes — “and even tenants discovering a dead body in an elevator,” she said during the news conference.
Cedar Run was issued a notice of violation by the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment in September for “unsafe and unsanitary conditions,” along with other transgressions, according to documents obtained by The Denver Post.
“The problems that have persisted at Cedar Run go back years, and they are squarely, solely the responsibility of Gelt Venture,” Altman said. And the management company has neglected to make fixes, she added.
Gelt Venture Partners said in a statement Monday that the firm was doing everything in its power to provide residents with a clean and safe place to call home. It recently spent $200,000 on new doors, better lighting, locks and other maintenance, the statement says, and is working with the Denver health department to repair exterior and interior damage typically caused by nonresidents who break into the buildings.
Denver police checks on the property every week, and they’re working to stop those who aren’t residents from entering the buildings to get warm, according to the statement.
Apartment Management Consultants representatives Theresa Foss and Robyn Streeks didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Altman highlighted the goal of the lawsuit as preserving both tenancy and housing, not displacing residents with building closures.
Attorney Andrew Lipscomb said he’d like to reach an agreement with the landlord to fully restore the doors, mailboxes and other infrastructure to working condition.
“This is a case to get repairs,” Lipscomb said.
Cedar Run has made local headlines in recent years. It was one of several apartment complexes targeted in last month’s large-scale ICE raids across metro Denver. And in 2023, residents organized a sidewalk protest and formed a tenants’ union to demand better living conditions after reporting problems like cockroaches and black mold to management and to the city’s health department.
“We don’t receive support from management,” Haley Eicher, a lawsuit plaintiff, said. “So that’s what we’re really looking for — just to improve our living conditions.”
Mark Sokolaj, a plaintiff, said the laundry rooms and mailboxes weren’t functional, and holes in his bathroom ceiling went unfixed for two years.
Sokolaj, 27, moved to Cedar Run in 2017 after he graduated from high school, and he is on his 10th lease at the complex. He lives in a one-bedroom apartment with his wife and 3-month-old child.
“We should not need to be here this morning, suing our landlord, but here we are,” Sokolaj said.
At the news conference, David Seligman, the executive director of the nonprofit law firm Towards Justice, stepped up to the microphones to address the recent ICE raid.
“Very often, these raids are not only about pointing the finger and shifting blame: They’re also about scaring people,” Seligman said. “They have the effect of scaring people, in order to allow corporations to continue evading the law.”
The enforcement actions can deter people from confronting their landlords about problems, he added.
“What is really exceptionally important about this case is that there are people here still, people who are willing to stand up,” Seligman said.
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