Lew

Petitioners Albert G. Lew and B. K. Lew, owners of an apartment building in Berkeley, seek a peremptory writ of mandate to compel respondent superior court to set aside its judgment in favor of 75 plaintiffs in a consolidated small claims matter. We issued an alternative writ at the direction of the Supreme Court and, having considered the merits of the petition, now discharge the alternative writ and deny the petition.

Procedural and Factual Background

Real parties (plaintiffs below and hereafter) are neighbors of a 36-unit HUD-insured section 8 ( 42 U.S.C. § 1437 et seq.) apartment complex owned by petitioners located at 1615-1617 Russell Street, Berkeley, California. In August 1991, 66 actions were filed by plaintiffs in small claims court and consolidated for trial. According to the exemplar claim attached to the instant petition, plaintiffs contended that the defendants “allow illegal activity to occur on their property at 1615 & 1617 Russell St. which has caused me emotional and mental distress.” Plaintiffs prevailed in small claims court, and petitioners appealed. The appeals were consolidated with nine others for a total of seventy five, and a trial de novo was…