Video of Fight at South Florida Condo Board Meeting Makes Nightly News

Our firm’s other community association attorneys and I have witnessed, or heard about, scores of heated exchanges between disgruntled unit owners and board members at community association board of directors’ meetings. However, a video that aired on WPLG Local 10 nightly news last week involving the physical attack of a unit owner by the then-president of the condominium association governing the Waterbridge Condominiums in Sunrise left many of us shocked.

In the video, association member Stephen Smith is shown requesting association financial documents from the members of the board at a 2009 video-recorded board meeting. Subsequent to his request, the then-president of the association, Jacqueline Chance, physically attacks Smith, causing a brawl between the two and others present at the meeting. WPLG reports that Chance was charged with battery as a result of the altercation, and she pled no contest to same. The station further reports that the depicted violent exchange was not the first time Smith was attacked by a board member within this community. Smith was apparently criticized and confronted by board members in previous years in connection with his requests for association records.

Smith explains that in addition to being assailed by board members for requesting association records and questioning the status of the association’s reserve account, he has also been harassed for requesting that his unit be repaired by the association following a fire to the condominium building.

Smith has filed a lawsuit against the condominium association based upon a theory of negligence, which Smith says arose because the actions and decisions of the association’s board of directors have resulted in his inability to sell his unit. We actively await the outcome of Smith’s lawsuit (the next hearing is scheduled for November), as the video and audio recordings included in the report by Local 10 are undoubtedly very damaging to the association.

Click below to watch the video, and click here to read the report on WPLG’s website.