By Ayesha Hana Shaji
Texas Metro News Team
Attorney Mark Melton, co-founder of the Dallas Eviction Advocacy Center (DEAC), said the eviction crisis is brutal and families are suffering in Dallas County.
Speaking at the Dallas Democratic Forum’s Injustice of the Peace: The Complicity of a Broken System in Creating an Eviction Crisis, Melton discussed the eviction crisis in Dallas County and the role of the Justice of the Peace (JP) courts in exacerbating the problem.
“I’ve made some crazy claims about the 80 plus percent error rates of the JP courts, which by the way, is why I really call this speech an injustice of the peace,” he said, introducing the audience to what he considers to be the main problems. “Because justice is a thing that does not often happen in many JP courts.”
According to The Texas Judiciary’s 2021 Annual Statistical Report, after reaching an all-time high in 2019, new landlord/tenant cases filed in justice courts fell 28 percent in 2020 and another 31 percent in 2021. The number of cases filed in 2021 was the lowest since 2000.
The report attributed the dip to the COVID pandemic. Restrictions were placed on filing eviction cases starting half-way through fiscal year 2020 and rental assistance programs were also introduced during the pandemic to assist renters in paying overdue rent.
However, according to a study by Child Poverty Action Lab (CPAL) in 2022, where they looked at eviction cases in Dallas County, through August 2022, 28,845 evictions have been filed in Dallas County, representing a 223% increase over the same time period in 2021 and a 203% increase over the same time period in 2020.
The CPAL study also found that the judge ruled in favor of the landlord in 72% of cases and in favor of the tenant in only 3% of cases.
Melton said the DEAC was an accident, beginning with a viral Facebook post he made about the eviction moratorium. He woke up to tons of messages and comments asking for legal advice and representation.
So he started as a pro bono program operating under the name DallasEvictions2020. In their first year, over 250 lawyers volunteered and more than 6,500 households were assisted. Today, he said, they were able to serve over 12,000 households.
DEAC has won 97% of its 2,442 cases in 2022, Melton said, adding that these were mostly cases where they would go to justice of the peace courts and randomly ask tenants if they wanted representation.
“No one should win 97% of your cases, especially in an environment where you’re not taking your clients,” he said. “I can walk up without knowing this person’s name, without knowing their story, without knowing any of their defenses and I can represent them in a court and win 97% of the time.”
Those evictions have a pro-found impact on school attendance. 60% of the students who leave in the middle of the school year in Dallas ISD are the results of evictions, Melton said.
Stressing the importance of having legal representation when going to court, Melton said if you don’t show up at court, there is an 84% chance you will be evicted, citing the CPAL study.
“If you do show up though, you only have a 57% chance of getting evicted on that day, which is significantly better,” Melton said. “If you have a lawyer representing you, first of all, you’re more likely to show up. Second of all you’re almost certainly more likely to win.”
Melton said, according to the study, they found that if someone has a lawyer, there is only a 10% chance of losing the case, which means there is only a 10% chance of getting evicted.
Ayesha Hana Shaji is a 2022 graduate of the University of Texas at Arlington, where she was on The Shorthorn staff.
