Two More Lawsuits Filed Against Veranda House Owners, Employees

Two more lawsuits have been filed against the owners of the Veranda House, as well as other hotel staff/personnel who were employed when the massive fire struck the historic hotel in July of 2022.

Both lawsuits were filed earlier this month and name the Rhode Island real estate investment firm that owns the Veranda House - the Procaccianti Companies - as a defendant, along with its insurance companies and three hotel staff members. The new litigation comes as the Procaccianti Companies is nearing the completion of the rebuild of the Veranda House on Step Lane.

The first lawsuit was filed by Franklin Harris, who lives at 5A Step Lane. He is accusing the hotel owners and staff members for negligence that led to the three-story, 18-room hotel being engulfed in flames after the root cause of the fire was determined to be an employee improperly disposing of a cigarette. The suit explains that Harris was home when the fire broke out and that it resulted in his home being destroyed and taking the life of his cat.

“As a direct and proximate result of the foregoing negligent acts and omissions of defendants, plaintiffs suffered significant uninsured financial and economic damages including but not limited to those related to the loss of his personal property, housing dislocation, lost wages and lost earning capacity, moving expenses, temporary housing costs, and others.” The suit alleges.

Harris also mentions the lack of an automatic sprinkler system and carbon monoxide detectors having been recently disabled by the hotel.

“Prior to the date of the fire, there had been an ongoing problem with the improper disposal of smoking materials at the Veranda House as evidenced by cigarette butts littering the exterior grounds of the hotel premises,” the suit says. “Abutters had previously complained about the improper disposal of smoking materials to Veranda House staff. (The defendants) failed to develop, impose, and/or enforce appropriate smoking policies or restrictions related to the safe disposal of smoking materials on the hotel premises including but not limited to a designated smoking area with designated smoking material disposal equipment.”

Harris is seeking an amount in damages to be determined and is demanding a jury trial on nine negligence counts.

The second lawsuit was filed by Estelle Lehmann and David Lehmann, who are suing the same defendants as Harris. The Lehmann’s are a married couple from Brooklyn, New York who were staying at the Veranda House when the fire broke out.

The Lehmann’s say in the suit that they were asleep on the upper floor when a fire alarm woke them up. They said they saw flames coming over their balcony and “made a frantic escape from an inferno that quickly consumed their room.” As they fled, they lost contact with each other and thought the other had been trapped and burned – causing “severe emotional distress with physical manifestations of objective symptomatology.”

As a direct and proximate result of the foregoing negligent acts and omissions of (the defendants), plaintiffs suffered, and continue to suffer, severe emotional distress with physical harm manifested by objective symptomatology from this catastrophic event along with over $10,000 in uninsured personal property loss from the fire."

The Lehmann’s are also demanding a jury trial on nine counts of negligence and are asking for an amount in damages to be determined, but an amount that is “fair and reasonable.” They are accusing the hotel owners and staff members of negligence for the same reasons as Harris.

Harris and the Lehmann’s are represented by Jonathan D. Sweet of Keches Law Group, who has been representing other victims of the fire who either lost personal belongings while staying at the Veranda House or had their neighboring homes either damaged or destroyed as a result of the fire.

These two lawsuits now bring the total number of suits against the Veranda House to five. While a pair of neighbors are seeking millions of dollars in the aftermath of the fire, a lawsuit filed last month was seeking $12,000 in property damage.