Paying for Calling Black Boy ‘A Mistake’: White Landlord Who Evicted Biracial Family From Lakeside Rental Property In Virginia Faces $750K Jury Verdict
A white Virginia landlord who evicted two families from her lakefront rental property upon learning one of the family members was Black will have to pay them $750,000 after a jury awarded damages in a trial last month.
The verdict marks the largest fair housing award ever obtained by the Virginia attorney general’s office, according to a news release issued Thursday by Attorney General Jason Miyares.
Angela Smith and her bestie, Amanda Mills, rented lots near each other for campers at the Lazy Cove Campground at Smith Mountain Lake in Penhook, Virginia during the coronavirus pandemic so that their families could frolic in the great outdoors together, according to the lawsuit.
The two women have been best friends since they were 16 years old. Mills was in the delivery room when Smith gave birth to one of her children, the complaint says.
Mills and her family are white, and Smith, who is white, is married to Damien Smith, who is Black. They have an 8-year-old son who is biracial. Mills is his godmother.
In April of 2020, Angela Smith negotiated a six-month lease with campground owner Regina Turner, while her husband and son milled around the property, her complaint says. Turner saw Smith’s son, who is dark-skinned, that day but did not see Damien Smith.
On June 11, 2020, weeks after the Smiths had moved in, Turner called Mills to complain that she had “pulled the wool over her eyes,” the complaint says.
“You didn’t tell me that your friend’s husband is Black,” Turner allegedly told Mills. “Had I known I wouldn’t have rented the lot to them. I saw the son, but I figured everyone makes a mistake.”
About a month later, Turner told Brenda Cash, Mills’s mother, that she intended not to renew the Smiths’ lease and that Mills “did me wrong” by not telling her that Damien Smith was Black.
She further explained to Cash that “when you get a Black person in the park, then you’re going to end up with a lot more to come in.”
Turner told Cash that she knew evicting the Mills and Smiths would cause legal trouble, so she would wait and not renew their leases.
Once they learned of Turner’s racist statements and her plans to push them out, the Smith and Mills families decided to leave the campground. They said Turner refused to offer a prorated refund for the remainder of their leases or to allow them to sell their campers on-site, which she had allowed white tenants to do previously.
The Mills had built a large deck around their camper and installed a gravel driveway, and took additional losses on those investments, the lawsuit says.
The camper purchased by the Smiths already had a deck installed, which they had to pay contractors to remove, incurring some damage to their camper in the process and diminishing its resale value, they said.
The Smith family suffered emotional distress as a result of Turner’s discrimination, their lawsuit says.
“Angela and Damien had to explain to their minor son why the family had to move. Their son lost friendships he had formed at the Campground and witnessed the turmoil Turner’s discrimination caused his parents,” the complaint says. It further claims that Damien Smith “purposefully kept out of sight while at the dwelling to avoid Turner,” “suffered heightened awareness of his skin color” and that her discrimination against the family affected his work and his relationship with his son.
Turner’s plan to evict both families over the race of the Smith family, in violation of their civil rights and state and federal housing law, prompted an investigation by the Virginia Fair Housing Board and ultimately, the civil lawsuit filed against Turner by the Commonwealth of Virginia in April of 2023.
During the fair housing board investigation, Turner, who was then 69, insisted that her best friend is Black and that she was misunderstood.
“My husband did not like Black people. I don’t have a problem with it. My BFF is Black,” she said, according to the investigative report. She did acknowledge to the investigator that her late husband had a rule of not allowing Black people to rent lots at the campground and that she continued to use his rules after he died.
“I’ve bent over backwards for all these people and I think that they have took this a little too far,” she said during the interview.
Turner filed an answer denying all of the families’ allegations of discrimination and injury and calling the plaintiffs’ demand for $1 million in damages “frivolous, capricious, arbitrary and libelous,” but then failed to respond to subsequent motions and requests for discovery in the lawsuit.
In August of 2023 a judge issued a default judgment in the plaintiffs’ favor and ruled that Turner could not introduce any evidence at trial, which would only determine the amount of damages.
Both families testified during a two-day trial in February at Franklin County Circuit Court in rural Rocky Mount, Virginia.
The jury took less than two hours to deliberate and decide on their historic verdict, awarding $100,000 to each couple for their losses, as well as the humiliation and emotional toll they endured, the attorney general’s release said. The jury awarded an additional $350,000 to Angela and Damien Smith and $200,000 to Amanda and Michael Mills in punitive damages “to punish Turner’s egregious actions and serve as deterrent against future discrimination.”
“Housing discrimination — and discrimination of any kind — will not be tolerated in Virginia,” said Miyares. “We are pleased by the jury’s verdict, and I’m immensely proud of my Civil Rights Unit. The people of Franklin County have spoken: Smith Mountain Lake is for everyone.”
Damien Smith told the Washington Post he was surprised by the jury’s verdict, which “was like a sigh of relief, but at the same time, I’m still angry because we never should have had to go through this,” he said. “It was 2020 at the time, and somehow we’re still getting judged by the color of our skin versus the kind of person we are.”
Of his family’s disappointment, he said, “It was hurtful because I knew we couldn’t stay there, and my little boy was having a good time.”
He said of all the comments the complaint alleges that Turner made, the one that compelled the family to sue was that she called their son “a mistake.”
In an interview, Turner told the Post she never evicted the families and that they left of their own accord, but she didn’t deny calling Mills with concerns after learning Damien Smith is Black.
“I did say that to a degree,” Turner said of the phone call. “I said I have a right to know who’s moving in. I did feel betrayed.”
Turner’s lawyer Holland Perdue, who is the mayor of nearby Rocky Mount, filed a motion on March 12 to set aside the jury’s “exorbitant” verdict and to reduce the award of damages “to a fair and reasonable amount consistent with the evidence presented at trial,” which she argued did not substantiate that the plaintiffs had suffered “severe harm.”
Turner “never acted with malice or reckless disregard,” the motion said. “Her conduct, even if deemed in violation of the law, does not justify a verdict of this magnitude.”
A court hearing to review the motion is scheduled for April 8.