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Teens settle mall suit
Andrea Weigl, Staff Writer
RALEIGH -- Two teenage girls have settled their lawsuit alleging that officials with Crabtree Valley Mall's private police department should have known one of their officers was a "sexual predator."
The confidential monetary settlement, ending the litigation, was reached last week during mediation, lawyers involved in the case revealed Wednesday.
"The matter has been resolved," said Raleigh lawyer Elizabeth Kuniholm, who represented the girls, who were 15 and 17 when a mall officer allegedly assaulted them. It is The News & Observer's policy not to identify victims of sexual abuse.
In 1997, Crabtree police officer Willie Donald White Jr. met the sisters while running a law enforcement training program at the Raleigh mall for 14- to 20-year-olds. White invited the two girls to his home near the mall and assaulted them, investigators said. White pleaded guilty to several counts of taking indecent liberties with a minor.
White had been fired or forced to resign from police departments in Roanoke Rapids and Rich Square because of inappropriate conduct involving teenage girls, Kuniholm alleged in this litigation. Kuniholm argued that mall police officials should have known White's history and not assigned him to the youth program.
The lawsuit also alleged that former Crabtree Police Chief James Condor was aware that another officer, Jon O'Dell, was under investigation for sexual misconduct with a teenage girl when he worked for the Clayton Police Department before joining the mall force. Condor assigned O'Dell, who later became chief, and White to run the youth program, the suit says.
The defendants say they did appropriate background checks on White, who denies forcing the girls to have sex. They argue there is no way mall or police officials could have known about the relationships.
The young women sued White; Condor, O'Dell, Steve Lane, and James Blow, all supervising officers; the mall police department; CVM Associates, which owns the mall; and Plaza Associates, the firm that managed the mall and the police department.
Raleigh lawyer Walter E. Brock Jr., who represented Condor, O'Dell, Lane and Blow, confirmed that the case had been dismissed but declined to discuss terms of the settlement.
© 2002 by The News & Observer Pub. Co. Reprinted with permission of The News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina. Reproduction does not imply endorsement.