Lawyer in Elevator Death Case Now Certain He's Sued the Wrong People
Categories: Law & Order
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| Dr. Dan Kliman, who died in a building not owned by the Stephens family or Academy of Art University |
The attorney representing the mother of a man who bizarrely fell to his death last year from a downtown San Francisco elevator now admits he's sued people who don't own the building in question -- and he's sorry about that.
Lawyer Ian Zimmerman on Tuesday filed a $30 million suit against Coast Counties Management, Inc. and the Kone Elevator company along with Scott and Elisa Stephens -- the scions of the Academy of Art University Empire. SF Weekly's subsequent trip to the Assessor's office, however, revealed that the deed to 55 New Montgomery Street is held by Robert Bernheim and Nancy Bernhem Rogers in conjunction with the Bernheim Family Trust. A spokeswoman for the Stephenses and the Academy denied either had any connection to the Sharon Building at 55 New Montgomery, where Dr. Dan Kliman died in baffling circumstances last Thanksgiving. Zimmerman, it seems, picked one of the buildings in that area not owned by the Stephens family or Academy.
"I have asked my office to file an immediate dismissal against every one of your clients who were mistakenly named in this lawsuit," Zimmerman wrote yesterday to an Academy of Art lawyer. One could also speculate that the Bernheims will be getting a letter of a different sort in the coming days. As for how this happened, Zimmerman has a theory.
When his investigator, J.A. Stevenot, punched the address "55 New Montgomery" into the SFGov.org Web site, he was led to information he believed placed that address in property parcel No. 3707-014. Yet the Assessor has the address as part of parcel No. 3707-035.
For our complete archive of stories about the mysterious death of Dr. Dan Kliman, visit here.
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