A Los Angeles jury ordered a landlord to pay a $387,000 penalty last week for illegally evicting a cannabis business in 2019. The landlord also abducted the tenant’s dog for nearly a month, according to court documents.
The case stems from a 2019 dispute over a property south of downtown LA. CJ World, a cannabis company, had been renting the warehouse since 2012 and had a lease until 2020. But the building’s owner, a company called 147-151 W 25th St LLC, illegally changed the building’s locks in September of 2019 in an attempt to have a second cannabis company rent the space for a higher rent, according to court documents.
When the landlord changed the locks in 2019, it also took the tenant’s 40-pound Australian shepherd named Po, according to court documents. The landlords reportedly abducted the dog for nearly a month, only returning the dog after the tenants sent a demand letter to the owners of the leasing company, court documents say.
CJ World sued the leasing company and its owners, Avi Aframian and Babak Aframian, claiming that the company had illegally breached its leasing contract and caused the cannabis company economic and emotional damages. SFGATE reached out to the Aframians' attorney for comment, but had not heard back at time of publication.