LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – A more than three-year court battle between a property owner, tenants, and Clark County resulted in the tenants having to relocate.
The property became the subject of a February hearing in Carson City to introduce Assembly Bill 211, aimed at targeting problem property owners.
“It’s been three years, and we’re still in court, and there’s just a handful of tenants left, so they’ve almost accomplished their objective, but it’s still an ongoing problem,” Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom said. “You drive by there and think, ‘Oh my God, how could that be?'”
The Apex apartments are located just north of UNLV, a neighborhood that Segerblom represents.
Assembly Bill 211 would allow cities and counties to ask a court for the jurisdiction to become a receiver.
“The solution would be obviously for us to step in, manage the property ourselves, fix it up, and keep those 200 people in their unit as opposed to put them on the street,” Segerblom said.
By 2025, most of the tenants at the Apex apartments had left. Buildings on one side of the property are boarded up, while buildings on the other side are mostly boarded up aside from the few units that appeared to be occupied.
The 8 News Now Investigators began reporting on the Apex apartments after viewers reached out in 2021. The property had drastically deteriorated since California-based Pro-Residential Services purchased the property in January of that year.
The 8 News Now Investigators learned the property was operating without a license. The county issued a notice of violation.
By 2022, the county filed a lawsuit against the property owners.
The property had become crime-ridden. In addition to four homicides within a year, the county referred to 700 calls for service, a stabbing, 19 shootings, a swat search for a drug house, and 50 burglaries or robberies.
The 8 News Now Investigators also learned the owners had collected more than $300,000 in COVID-19 rental relief money.
A Clark County District Court judge required the owners to provide security on the property and make repairs. The court gave the owners a chance after chance.
A settlement was reached in January, according to a February court filing.
“The settlement agreement contemplates that the parties will work together to address issues with the property and, ultimately, Apex will receive a permanent business license upon compliance,” the document stated.
The owners are shutting the property down to make repairs, according to the document.
Nicholas Haley, a consumer rights attorney with the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada, represented some of the tenants.
“This is anarchy,” Haley said. “It’s sad.”
In the end, he said, the property owners appeared to win.
“There were very, very severe consequences for the people who lived there, and they had no redress anywhere,” Haley told the 8 News Now Investigators. “The court was not interested. The landlord was not interested, and the county, to their credit, filed a lawsuit, but even that ended with a slap on the wrist as far as we’re concerned.”
According to Segerblom, Assembly Bill 211, could help prevent what unfolded at the Apex apartments from happening again.
