Nightmare stories about crazy condo boards abound. But few could trump the tale James E. King told during a defamation trial earlier this month.
He accused the Santee Resort Condominium Association of launching a smear campaign against him by spreading rumors that he was a child molester who partied with underage girls and strippers in two condo units he owned and rented out.
The condo board was irritated with King and targeted him because he owed a few hundred dollars in dues, according to his attorney, Jason A. Daigle of the Maybank Law Firm in Charleston.
Now, the board owes King $890,000 in damages, according to a jury verdict reached Dec. 5 at the Clarendon County Court of Common Pleas.
Testimony showed that someone at the condo had distributed copies of a page printed from a state government website, which showed a sex offender’s mug shot and rap sheet pulled from the state registry. The page insinuated the man was King, but no one would confess to passing around the misinformation, Daigle said.
“Everyone testified that the printout was stuck underneath the door of the condo association’s office,” he added. “We don’t know who did it or when they did it. … Someone’s lying, but I can’t prove who it is.”
The offender in the printout has the same name as King and both are slightly built white men, but the similarities end there, according to Daigle. He wrote in a pretrial brief that “King has never been convicted of any crime, much less a sex offense.”
One of King’s renters told defendant board member Leah Londeree that the man in the printout was not King. Londeree also had never seen King. Still, she admitted that she later phoned a loan officer at King’s bank, which was foreclosing on his condos, and asked if the bank official knew she was dealing with a pervert. The loan officer testified at King’s trial that Londeree told her King was a child molester.
King also alleged that board member James Kinser had falsely accused him of giving booze to underage girls and strippers during parties at the condo, which is an old Sheraton hotel building near Lake Marion. While King rented his units to exotic dancers, he is a married man and was not cavorting with the dancers, according to Daigle.
The jury deliberated for about eight hours over two days before awarding King $550,000 in actual damages and $340,000 in punitive damages. Daigle expected that the condo board’s insurance would cover the verdict.
The board’s attorney did not respond to an interview request. Daigle said the defendants’ highest settlement offer before the suit went to trial was $50,000. They offered to settle for $120,000 during trial and rejected King’s demand of $390,000.
Daigle added that the $890,000 verdict appears to be the largest in Clarendon County’s history.
“What worse can you call someone?” he said. “There’s literally nothing worse you can call someone than a sex offender or child molester.”
The run-in with the condo board left King’s reputation sullied in his hometown and spurred him to pack up his belongings and shutter his business, which sold promotional advertising items such as bumper stickers and drink koozies, according to Daigle.
He and his wife now live in Charleston, where they operate a rug cleaning business.
Follow Phillip Bantz on Twitter @SCLWBantz
VERDICT REPORT: DEFAMATION
Case name: James King v. Santee Resort Condominium Association, et al.
Case number: 2011-CP-14-00541
Court: Common Pleas, Clarendon County
Date of verdict: Dec. 5
Amount: $890,000
Demand: $950,000 pretrial/$390,000 at trial
Attorneys for plaintiff: Jason A. Daigle and Roy P. Maybank (Charleston) and Shaun C. Kent (Manning)
Attorneys for defendants: J. Jakob Kennedy (Florence) and William H. Johnson (Manning)