LDF Continues to Demand Accountability in Court After California City Illegally Seized Black Homeowner’s Property

A California court ruled today that LDF must amend its lawsuit against the City of Piedmont, California, if the lawsuit is to proceed. The lawsuit, originally filed in February 2026 by LDF and co-counsel Seyfarth Shaw LLP, challenges the city’s illegal taking of the property of Sidney and Iréne Dearing, the first Black homeowners in Piedmont.

The City attempted to dismiss the case in its entirety, on the basis of timeliness. However, today’s ruling grants LDF and co-counsel the ability to file an amended lawsuit in regard to two of its key claims rooted in the City’s  fraudulent taking of the Dearing’s home. While disappointed in this temporary setback of their client’s case, LDF and co-counsel welcome the opportunity to strengthen the complaint’s allegations.

“Black land loss in America often is not accidental,” said Leah Aden, Senior Counsel at the Legal Defense Fund. “As in Piedmont, California, it far too often is a racist tactic carried out by violence and illegal government action to deprive Black people of their dignity as well as their property. The Dearing family deserves the full remedies that justice and the law demand.” 

“This case is all about overdue justice and accountability,” said Arnold E. Brown II, Partner at Seyfarth Shaw LLP. “Rectifying the harm done to the Dearing family by the City of Piedmont not only benefits the descendants but also the broader community. Seyfarth is proud to provide our services on a pro bono basis to help correct a wrong that has lingered for more than a century.”

“The City of Piedmont is once again trying to use the courts to further harm the Dearings and deny them what they are owed,” said Morgan Elle Humphrey, Counsel at the Legal Defense Fund. “This is about accountability for actions that violated state law and produced real and lasting harm. But the City of Piedmont would rather avoid that accountability, just as they avoided accountability for the racial terrorism that the Dearings endured a century ago. This lawsuit must proceed.” 

This case is part of a long pattern in California and nationwide of governmental action to forcibly expel Black people from their property. In 1924, Piedmont fraudulently took the Dearings’ home using a fabricated public purpose to coerce the Dearings to vacate their property. Then the city sold the property to a white person.  

The forced property taking was done amidst a relentless campaign of violence in which city officials failed to protect the Dearings from threats of lynching, multiple attempted bombings, a 500-person mob, and other racially motivated terror meant to oust them from their home. The Dearings never discovered the city’s fraud in their lifetimes. And it wasn’t until 2025 that the great granddaughter of Sidney and Iréne Dearing discovered the fraud and brought that claim to court. 

LDF and Seyfarth seek to amend the original allegations in the lawsuit to continue to move towards justice, redress, and accountability for the plaintiff, a descendant of the Dearings. That redress could include an apology and monetary compensation for Piedmont’s actions that deprived the Dearings of their home, generational wealth, and other benefits of home ownership such as access to high quality education in the wealthy enclave. 

Visit here to learn more about the Piedmont case. 

Click here to read the release on the Legal Defense Fund's website.

### 

Founded in 1940, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) is the nation’s first civil rights legal organization. LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957, though it was founded under the leadership of Thurgood Marshall while he was at the NAACP. LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute (TMI) is a division of LDF that undertakes innovative research and houses LDF’s archive. In all media attributions, please refer to us as the Legal Defense Fund or LDF (do not include NAACP) and refer to the Institute as LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute or TMI.

 

About Seyfarth: With more than 1,000 lawyers across 19 offices, Seyfarth Shaw LLP provides advisory, litigation, and transactional legal services to clients worldwide. The firm is recognized for its innovative approach, advancing the standard of legal service delivery in an evolving global marketplace.

Seyfarth collaborates with clients to capitalize on opportunities and solve complex challenges across capabilities, including corporate, litigation, real estate, regulatory compliance, labor and employment, and executive compensation and employee benefits. Committed to collaboration and a client-centered approach, Seyfarth delivers solutions as sophisticated as the challenges clients face.