\nThe Harmon Hotel was supposed to be the front door to CityCenter\u2019s high-rise complex on the Strip.<\/p>\n
\tInstead, it\u2019s being demolished piece by piece because construction defects left it vulnerable to earthquakes.<\/p>\n
\tSix years after those defects were discovered and hotel construction stopped at 26 floors, the massive legal dispute between CityCenter and the hotel\u2019s builders is heading to trial. Like the demolition of the hotel, the trial is expected to last a year.<\/p>\n
\tThe case is unusual not only because of its length of time; court officials had to plan and make rare accommodations to handle the large number of lawyers and amount of evidence involved in the case.<\/p>\n
\tAbout four dozen chairs were removed from District Judge Elizabeth Gonzalez\u2019s courtroom gallery to make room for additional lawyers\u2019 tables. Limited seating will be available for members of the public.<\/p>\n
\tHoles were drilled in the floor to run wires to the lawyers\u2019 tables, which will have monitors and microphones, and two 80-inch monitors are being installed for the jury.<\/p>\n
\tCourt information technology director Michael Doan said each party will have its own technology team to display the more than 3 million digitally stored pieces of evidence.<\/p>\n
\tA paper list of that evidence fills more than 100 document-storage boxes, he said.<\/p>\n
\tOther numbers in the case, which involves more than $400 million in damage claims, are equally staggering. For example, 6,000 potential jurors were informed of the yearlong proceedings before the pool was whittled down to about 600 people, who then filled out questionnaires.<\/p>\n
\tCourt spokeswoman Mary Ann Price said 430 potential jurors remain and will be taken to the courtroom in groups of 50 for additional questioning starting Tuesday. She estimated that jury selection will last a week or two.<\/p>\n
\tThe case stems from the construction of CityCenter, MGM Resorts International\u2019s 67-acre development on the southwest corner of the Strip and West Harmon Avenue. The Harmon Hotel is the only portion of the $9 billion project that was never completed. Work stopped on the Harmon after construction defects were found in 2008.<\/p>\n
\tA structural engineer hired by MGM Resorts determined the building was unsafe and could topple if an earthquake of a magnitude of 7.7 were to hit Las Vegas. Construction on the planned 47-story tower was stopped at 26 floors.<\/p>\n
\tRelated litigation began in 2010.<\/p>\n
\tAccording to a synopsis of the case provided to potential jurors, Perini Building Co. and MGM entered into an agreement for construction of CityCenter in 2005. Perini then entered into agreements with hundreds of subcontractors to complete the project.<\/p>\n
\tThose subcontractors included the following companies, which are parties in the civil case: Century Steel Inc., whose subcontract was assigned to Pacific Coast Steel during construction; Ceco Concrete Construction; Show Canada Industries Inc.; and Steel Engineers Inc.<\/p>\n
\tPotential jurors were informed that because of issues that came to light in 2008, \u201cCityCenter withheld certain payments due to Perini. Perini similarly withheld payments due its subcontractors Pacific Coast Steel and Ceco. Perini initiated a lien foreclosure action against CityCenter as did Pacific Coast Steel and Ceco. CityCenter filed a claim for damages against Perini.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tAccording to the case synopsis, \u201cPerini and CityCenter have accused each other of breaching their contract, and each side is requesting money damages.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tClaims relating to payments at the project were brought by Steel Engineers and Show Canada, and other payment disputes involve Pacific Coast Steel, Ceco Concrete and Silver Steel Inc.<\/p>\n
\tIn the questionnaire, potential jurors were asked to give general background information and to describe their habits related to reading and viewing the news. The form included nearly 100 questions.<\/p>\n
\tOne question specifically asked, \u201cDo you believe you have seen, read, or heard anything about this case?\u201d<\/p>\n
\tPotential jurors also were asked whether they had worked for a casino, hotel, architect or construction company; and whether they had \u201cever lived or worked in a building with construction-related defects or design problems.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tIn addition, potential jurors were asked to give their opinions on such topics as expert witnesses, large companies that own hotels and casinos, large general contractors and construction subcontractors.<\/p>\n
\tCourt records indicate the trial will be conducted in a series of \u201cmodules\u201d presented to the same jury. Each module will begin with opening statements restricted to the issues to be litigated in that module.<\/p>\n
\tGonzalez plans to conduct the trial four days a week. Mondays have been set aside for her to hear motions in other cases.<\/p>\n
No replies were posted for this topic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Harmon Hotel was supposed to be the front door to CityCenter\u2019s high-rise complex on the Strip. Instead, it\u2019s being demolished piece by piece because construction defects left it vulnerable to earthquakes. Six years after those defects were discovered and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latest-casino-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8214\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}