South Cook News

In yet another twist in the saga of a murky home-refurbishing program in Markham, the former special counsel hired by the city to help initiate the program is representing clients who are suing his former law partner.

In a counterclaim filed in mid-September in Cook County Circuit Court, Gary Grasso, the mayor of the Chicago suburb of Burr Ridge, is alleging that his former partner, Anthony Bass, committed legal malpractice twice related to his involvement with the Markham program. In the legal action, Grasso is representing Don Meadows and David Nuckolls of BP Capital Corp., the developer involved in the home-refurbishing program.

The city of Markham and two attorneys representing Markham, Steven Miller and Michelle Broughton-Fountain, are also named in the counterclaim.

No one involved has returned calls or emails from South Cook News seeking comment.

Under the Markham refurbishing plan and a similar one implemented in nearby Dolton, the municipalities will acquire the deeds of abandoned properties through the legal work of their special counsels, Grasso and Bass, and turn them over to developers, who were then obligated to refurbish the homes in exchange for forgiveness of unpaid property taxes, fines and penalties. In December 2017, Grasso and Bass billed Dolton $30,000 for their work.

For an earlier story, the Dolton village clerk told South Cook News that no records exist chronicling the outcome of the program that was designed to rebuild the distressed village’s tax base. No Markham officials responded to a request to learn more about the outcome of its program.

In a 2018 story published by the Better Government Association (BGA), Dolton residents complained about their dealings with BP Capital. One resident, Pink Dorsey, told BGA that he paid the firm $80,000 for titles to a dozen abandoned homes in nearby Markham. Dorsey said BP never turned over the titles.

“I’m just one small person and I got duped, but a whole village shouldn’t have gotten duped,” Dorsey said. “Somebody should have done their due diligence. … There's no telling what else somebody will try to sell Dolton."

Dorsey filed an action against BP Capital in July 2019. Grasso’s counterclaim, in which he is representing BP Capital, is attached to that lawsuit.

This isn’t the first lawsuit Grasso has brought related to the home-refurbishing programs.

Court documents show that in October 2018, Grasso, representing a group called Relion Homes, LLC, sued Dolton Mayor Riley Rogers over blocking the transfer of a deed for a residential property that showed the title was held by Relion. Relion is described in the lawsuit as a “joint-venture partner” of BP Capital.

The court filing includes a statement from Michael Grasso, who describes himself as “manager member of Relion Homes LLC.” Gary Grasso has a son, Michael, according to MyLife.com.