Milwaukee Autonomous Tenants Union
On June 26th, 2023 Joe Berrada, the largest private landlord in the City of Milwaukee, and his company Berrada Property Management (BPM), brought a defamation case against the Milwaukee Autonomous Tenants Union and one of MATU’s members at the Ozaukee County Circuit Court. Ryan J. Walsh of the Madison based firm Eimer Stahl LLP filed the complaint. Walsh is a right-wing operative that served as an aide to late right-wing Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia and other conservative judges before settling into private practice.
The complaint focuses on two specific references that were made to Berrada: one being an interview given by the member named in the complaint to CBS 58 News, and the other a Facebook post made about Berrada and his new employee Archie Blunt. Blunt managed the Special Enforcement section of the Department of Neighborhood Services (DNS) for 14 years before leaving to become the Community Relations Director for BPM. He will also play an instrumental role in opening BPM’s Tenant Learning Center which aims to “educate” tenants but will probably be used to propagandize tenants for BPM.
The interview given by the MATU member to the news focused on a fire that broke out in a townhouse apartment owned by BPM in November of 2022, which resulted in the death of a young child. MATU was invited to a protest that was planned against Berrada by community members affected by the fire. It was stated that the unit had been having consistent electrical problems for over a year and that the lights would often flicker, sparks would emit from the electrical outlets when plugging devices in, and that complaints had been made to BPM previously expressing concern about the wiring in the unit. https://tinyurl.com/4nxrvsbz
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