DAVENPORT, Iowa — May 28, 2024 marks one year since the apartment building at 324 N. Main Street partially collapsed in Davenport — and more questions than answers remain on who will be held accountable for the tragic event.
In the months following May 28, 2023, many surviving residents, family members of those who had passed and businesses impacted by the collapse filed lawsuits against multiple parties. Those include building owner Andrew Wold, his LLCs, the City of Davenport and city officials, along with various engineering and masonry firms. A previous property management company and property owner of the building have been named as well.
All of the individual lawsuits were consolidated in late September and have now become a class action lawsuit, court documents show. Additional residents and businesses have joined the class action since it was consolidated.
Court records show the case isn't set for trial until at least January 2026. As the case moves forward, it is likely some of the counts could be removed. The initial 143-page master petition outlining allegations against the defendants has already been amended once. That was to remove a count of common law negligence against former City Administrator Corri Spiegel after a judge approved a motion to dismiss it. Spiegel is still listed as a defendant in the suit despite there being no counts against her.
That dismissal came out of a motion to dismiss from the City of Davenport for multiple counts against it as a municipality and two other employees. The judge only accepted the dismissal of Spiegel's count but not the others. The City appealed the judge's decision to the Iowa Supreme Court but no ruling has come out of that appeal yet.
As of May 2024, there are 27 counts against various defendants in the case, including 16 counts of common law negligence, one count of negligence per se and five nuisance counts. Wold and his multiple LLCS face one count of piercing the corporate veil and the other four involve Wold allegedly selling several of his properties after the collapse at less than market value to rid of his assets. The lawsuit accuses Wold of doing this to limit the amount of compensation he would be able to provide if the lawsuit were settled.
What are the allegations?
Allegations in the current lawsuit span years, dating back to 2019 when the apartment building was owned and operated by Waukee Investments LLC and managed by Parkwild Properties L.C. It wasn't until June 2021 that Wold became the owner of the building.
After the 2020 derecho blew through the Quad Cities, Townsend Engineering was called to inspect The Davenport, which was owned and operated by Waukee and Parkwild at the time. A summary of that inspection, dated Aug. 18, 2020, says "the primary focus was directed at the exterior brick facade on the east and north sides of the sixth floor." Several bricks had fallen from the east side onto the sidewalk at the time of the inspection.
The engineering firm concluded "that the damage to the building is not structural and the building is safe to occupy," saying the brick facades had "separated in some locations causing the brick ties to come loose which allow bricks to fall." They recommended removing or stabilizing all loose bricks. Nothing about the west wall was mentioned in the 2020 inspection summary.
According to the lawsuit, inspection reports from the City of Davenport dated January 2020 to June 2020 noted issues on the west wall, including missing or damaged bricks.
Just a little over a week after Townsend's inspection, the lawsuit says the City of Davenport notified Waukee and Parkwild of numerous code violations, including exterior walls with "missing and deteriorated brick." Townsend Engineering was called to reinspect the apartment building in December when it recommended removing and replacing around 1,250 "missing, cracked or deteriorated bricks."
The suit accuses Townsend of failing "to appreciate the precarious and structurally unsound condition of the west exterior wall during its inspections."
After the collapse, the City of Davenport released photos from inspections at 324 Main St. spanning from November 2020 to January 2021. Those photos show the conditions of the bricks along the west wall.
"Photographs taken during an inspection by the City of Davenport in late 2020 and early 2021 show the condition of the building continued to worsen significantly to the point where the Defendants, including Townsend Engineering, knew or should have known that the building was in a dangerous condition and the health and safety of the tenants at The Davenport was in peril," the lawsuit reads.
According to the lawsuit, Waukee and Parkwild did perform some brick repairs in 2021. The suit says it was only in a small area, however, and "did not remotely account for the 1,250 bricks Townsend identified in its December 2020 report and did nothing to remedy the increasingly perilous structural condition of the west exterior wall."
The Davenport was painted brick red prior to being sold in June 2021. Waukee and Parkwild are accused in the suit of painting over the west wall to hide its condition. In addition, the suit says the painted brick trapped moisture and condensation "further compromising the wall’s structural stability and accelerating its deterioration."
"As a result of neglect and failures by Waukee, Parkwild, Townsend Engineering, and any the brick contractor(s) whose identities are not currently known, the repairs to the west exterior wall of The Davenport in 2020 and early 2021 were incomplete, insufficient, and did not address the perilous structural issues," the lawsuit reads. "Worse yet, Waukee and Parkwild, together with the knowledge of Townsend Engineering, purposefully hid and concealed the obviously dilapidated and deteriorating condition of the west exterior wall by painting the brick façade red prior to its sale."
In June 2021, the apartment building was purchased by Davenport Hotel, LLC, which Andrew Wold is and was the registered agent for. It sold for around $4.2 million, according to the lawsuit.
Just a month after the sale, the City sent a "Complaint Notice and Order" to Davenport Hotel LLC documenting substandard conditions along the west wall. In that document, it says a resident had reported an exit door on the west wall was difficult to open and that the drywall around it was not stable.
Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC allegedly did little to nothing to respond to the issues brought to them by the City. The lawsuit says the City issued another notice in September 2021 saying the conditions had not been corrected.
"With absolute and unequivocal notice of structural integrity concerns on the exterior west wall of The Davenport, and even after receiving two Notices from the City of Davenport warning of this imminent hazard, Wold/Davenport Hotel, L.L.C. did nothing to address these violations or protect the tenants," the lawsuit says. "Upon information and belief, Wold/Davenport Hotel, L.L.C. did not consult with a structural engineer, did not take any measures to repair or replace the failing wall, and did not do anything to address the issues that were not only identified by the City of Davenport, but were known to Wold/Davenport Hotel, L.L.C."
Fast forward to Feb. 2, 2023 — mere months before the collapse — the City issued a Notice of Public Hazard to Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC.
Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC had hired Select Structural Engineering LLC to perform an emergency inspection due to increasing complaints, the lawsuit says. Allegedly, it was the first time a structural engineering company was hired to inspect the building since the first notice from the City in 2021 after the building was bought. A summary of Select Structural's inspection, dated Feb. 2, details numerous issues of cracked and crumbling bricks on the west wall.
Select Structural concluded that the damaged area on the west wall was "not an imminent danger to the entire building and its residents" but that two beams needed to be shored with heavy posts to make repairs. One of those beams, according to the inspection summary, supported the second level of the building. The City's public hazard notice said that emergency vacate orders would be posted if the area on the west wall was not secured.
Bi-State Masonry was then hired to perform repairs and began working around Feb. 22. A city permit and the lawsuit say they were fired by Wold just a little over a week later on March 1. According to the suit, Wold did not agree to a change request that would've added $10,000 to the repair work.
On Feb. 28, Select Structural issued an addendum to its initial Feb. 2 report after a follow-up visit where they found "a large and potentially dangerous void beneath the facade wythe of clay brick." Debris was piling in the gap, causing the brick facade to bulge. Select Structural said it would soon cause a large panel of the facade to collapse, "creating a safety problem and potentially destabilizing the upper areas of brick facade." The engineering company recommended removing brick from the bowing area "in a safe, controlled manner" and then installing a CMU (concrete masonry unit) wall in that removed area.
However, once work was started on building that new CMU wall, Davenport's Chief Building Officer at the time, Trishna Pradhan, filed a notice to halt work due to the materials not matching the original brick. Since The Davenport was a historic landmark, city code requires any visible repairs to match the building material unless otherwise approved. Pradhan filed that notice on March 9, after Bi-State had been fired from the project. It's unclear who was installing the CMU wall before construction was stopped.
The lawsuit says additional work was done during March and April, however, the required shoring was never completed.
Days before the collapse on May 23, 2023, Select Structural returned to 324 Main St. and noted numerous "dire conditions" on the west wall, according to the lawsuit. The company noted the area appeared "ready to fall imminently" and that the area was bulging out several inches.
Photos from a May 25 inspection by Pradhan and Davenport's Director of Development and Neighborhood Services Richard Oswald, show just how far the building was bulging out on the west side. The photos also show two two-by-fours perched against the building which the lawsuit alleges Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC did "to make it look like they were complying with the City’s requirements to provide bracing to the exterior wall."
The lawsuit alleges that Pradhan and Oswald initially said the building passed the May 25 inspection and after the collapse, changed it to incomplete. It's unclear how, when or why the changes in the inspection were made.
The City, along with Pradhan and Oswald, are accused of not properly notifying residents of the issues with The Davenport despite years of citations for substandard conditions. The lawsuit also criticizes Pradhan and Oswald for not taking note of the bulging wall and "flimsy, deceitful, and contrived effort to brace the wall" during their May 25 inspection.
Just days before the collapse, Andrew Shaffer with R.A. Masonry warned contractors working on the building about the dangers. Shaffer said Wold had approached him in February, after firing Bi-State Masonry, about doing the repairs recommended by Select Structural. He said he thought the bid they gave was reasonable, but Wold rejected it because the cost was too high. Shaffer and his crew walked away, he said, because of his concerns about the safety of the building.
On May 26, 2023, Shaffer said he saw windows shattering on the west wall. The next day, he told contractors working on the building, "Get away from there. You're gonna die." One of those contractors ended up calling 911 on Saturday, May 27, to have the building checked out. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, News 8 learned that Davenport Fire was at the scene for four minutes before leaving. An email from the City in mid-June said the reason the firefighters left so soon was because they "observed active work occurring and external shoring was in place and observable."
"They observed that the external shoring was in place with no observable signs of difficulty or bowing in the external shoring," the email read. "Once inspectors left, work continued on the building on May 27 and throughout the day on Sunday, May 28."
The next day, on May 28 at 4:55 p.m., the building partially collapsed.
So who exactly is being sued?
There are a total of 19 defendants named in the lawsuit as of May 24.
Building owner Andrew Wold and several of his LLCs are named in the lawsuit. According to the suit, these include Davenport Hotel LLC (doing business as The Hotel Davenport Apartments), Andrew Wold Investments LLC, Village Property Management LLC and Alliance Contracting LLC. Wold is also being sued individually and as trustee for 3320 W. Harbor Revocable Trust. The suit shows all of these businesses working out of the same Bettendorf address that is allegedly Wold's previous home address.
Parkwild Properties, LLC, Waukee Investments, LLC, Select Structural, Bi-State Masonry and Townsend Engineering are also named due to their previous involvement with The Davenport.
The City of Davenport as a municipality is a defendant in the suit, along with Pradhan, Oswald and Spiegel. The City on its own faces five counts, including a criminal offense of common law negligence. Pradhan faces two negligence counts, with one of those being labeled a criminal offense; and Oswald faces one criminal offense of common law negligence. As mentioned, Spiegel's sole count was dismissed but she is still listed as a defendant.
The last group of defendants includes agencies that bought property from Wold or are LLCs he was involved in. According to the suit, these defendants are named because the plaintiffs "are seeking equitable remedies against its property under the Iowa Voidable Transactions Act."
What about the criminal investigation?
The Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) was requested to help investigate the collapse at 324 Main St. in the days following the tragic event. Its investigation wasn't announced until mid-July of last year. Iowa DCI confirmed with News 8 that they have completed their report. It now heads to the Scott County Attorney's Office, which will determine whether or not to file any criminal charges. No other updates in the criminal investigation have been made available.
Has there been any legislative action?
News 8's Jon Diaz spoke with Iowa State Rep. Monica Kurth, D-Scott County, in early May about what can be done in an event like the collapse.
Kurth says there is a connection between legislation made at a statewide level and its impact on county and municipality laws, specifically building codes.
"I have not been able to ferret it out yet," Kurth said. "But one of the things that we can do and have done is declare a disaster and bring in disaster assistance...We could do that in a faster, quicker way. Certainly, that's that's a need."
Two bills that passed this previous session are focused on just that. Kurth says she was on subcommittees for both. While they might not relate to preventing an event like the collapse, the bills do deal with how the state can react in a disaster.
The first one, HF2167, would raise the amount of individual disaster assistance from $5,000 to $7,000 for those who make less than 200% of the poverty line. It was signed into law by Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds on May 17.
"I was able to help shepherd that through committee and through our caucus, and then on the floor of the House, and was very pleased when that went through," Kurth said.
Another bill, HF2308, was signed into law in April and concerns how the state can respond when a federal disaster declaration is made. Kurth said the law sets the amount the state can quickly provide in the event of a disaster.
During the next session, Kurth hopes to advance legislation concerning land banks, which essentially help clean up failing infrastructure and turn them into something productive. She says it didn't make it through this year but she hopes she can push it through during the next session.
"I will be definitely advocating for that one to be brought in and worked on early next year," Kurth said. "It allows rehabilitation on some dilapidated and unfit-to-live-in structures, so certainly some of our buildings here would relate to that also."
News 8 has spent months compiling never-before-seen footage as part of a special report "A Community Rising: Davenport Collapse 1 Year Later." This story is one of many as we commemorate the one-year mark of the tragic event that rocked the Quad Cities community. It would not have been made possible without the hard work and determination of the following WQAD employees: Josh Lamberty, Jon Diaz, Joe McCoy, Jenna Webster, Jonathan Fong, Cesar Sanchez, Shelby Kluver, Scott Weas, Charles Hart, Mikaela Schlueter, Alec Doxsee, Jenny Hipskind, Andy McKay and Corey Spencer.
Find continuing coverage of the Davenport collapse on News 8's YouTube page