Billions awarded in Indian brothers’ LA real estate feud
An obscure 21-year legal feud involving five brothers from India who’ve amassed a fortune in diamonds and Los Angeles real estate burst into public view this week with a multibillion-dollar US verdict that may be among the largest of the decade.
After a five-month trial, a jury ordered Haresh Jogani to pay his brothers Shashikant, Rajesh, Chetan and Shailesh Jogani more than $2.5 billion in damages and to divide up shares of their Southern California property empire - about 17,000 apartments worth billions more.
The trial, over allegations that Haresh breached a longstanding partnership with his siblings, continues with a punitive damages hearing Monday that could add to the award.
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Jogani v. Jogani
The 2003 lawsuit already has been through 18 appeals, generations of attorneys and five judges in Los Angeles Superior Court. It’s drawing comparisons from some of the lawyers to the fictional Victorian-era probate case that Charles Dickens wrote about in his 1852 novel Bleak House. They’re calling Jogani v. Jogani the new Jarndyce v. Jarndyce, but with a twist.
“At end of the book, there was no money, hence the name, Bleak House,” said Peter Ross, an attorney who represents Chetan and Rajesh Jogani. “That’s not the case here. There’s billions here that remain to be distributed.”
Making the case more unusual is that most multibillion-dollar verdicts in the US are against giant corporations. How much each brother ultimately walks away with turns on the ups and downs of the real estate market, with apartment prices having fallen from their 2022 peak after higher interest rates raised borrowing costs and cut into property values. Apartment prices averaged $329,000 a unit in January in the Los Angeles area, down 26% from a November 2022 high, according to MSCI Real...