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JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SUES MOBILE ALABAMA APARTMENT OWNER

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The owner and former manager of an apartment complex in Mobile, Alabama, were sued today for engaging in a pattern of discrimination against apartment seekers who were black or who had young children, the Justice Department announced.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Mobile alleges that Ralph R. Johnson, owner of the Carriage Inn Apartments, and Dawn Stockton, a former employee, violated the Fair Housing Act by denying apartments to black persons and families with young children.

"This kind of blatant discrimination on the basis of race or family status has no place in our country," said William R. Yeomans, Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. "Denying people apartments because of their skin color or because they have children is illegal."

The Justice Department alleges that Johnson instructed employees of the Carriage Inn not to allow black persons or young children to live at the complex. Johnson's employees, including Stockton, carried out these instructions by refusing to rent apartments to black persons and families with young children and by falsely claiming that there were no available apartments for rent, according to the federal complaint.

The lawsuit seeks an order requiring the defendants to stop engaging in unlawful conduct, monetary damages for victims of the defendants' allegedly unlawful conduct, and payment of a civil penalty.

Anyone who believes they may have been the victims of discrimination at any of the defendants' properties should call the .Justice Department's Housing and Civil Enforcement Section at 1-800-896-7743.

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