Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto has filed a civil lawsuit against Ultimate Host, LLC, doing business as The Nightfall Group, a limited liability company based in Beverly Hills, for alleged violations of L.A.’s short term rental ordinance.

The lawsuit also targets The Nightfall Group’s owner and operator Mokhtar Jabli and three property owners who are alleged to have actively facilitated Nightfall’s illegal conduct. The complaint alleges glaring and persistent violations of the short-term rental ordinance and party house ordinance.

Feldstein Soto alleges that Nightfall – through the hundreds of properties it rents on a short-term basis – is a considerable contributor to problems involving party houses. Within the last two years, the Los Angeles Police Department has been called to Nightfall-associated properties more than 250 times in the Hollywood area alone, Feldstein Soto said. A residence at 9010 Hopen Place in the Hollywood Hills was the subject of 31 party-related calls for police assistance over the last two years, according to the complaint.

“These party houses have deleterious and serious effects on the quality of life for our city,” she added. “They disrupt communities, violate noise ordinances until the wee hours of the morning, clog evacuation routes and take valuable housing off the market. I expect this is the first of the enforcement actions we will need to bring.”

According to the complaint, Nightfall is a hosting platform as defined by the city’s short term rental ordinance, charging as much as $16,000 per night for a short-term rental. Unlike other similar platforms, Nightfall and its principal leased hundreds of properties and offered them as short-term rentals, the complaint alleges.

Leasing properties and offering them as short-term rentals is a violation of the ordinance, which limits a person to operating only one short-term rental property at a time, and requires the property to be the person’s primary residence. Additionally, operators of short-term rentals must register with the city’s Planning Department and include a registration number on all advertised listings. Nightfall repeatedly violates the provisions, the city attorney said.

The complaint also alleges that Nightfall allows other people to frequently use the short-term rentals as party houses, which greatly impacts quality of life in neighborhoods. Feldstein Soto said short-term rentals offered by the company are a threat to public safety, and that Nightfall is engaging in the type of conduct the City Council sought to prevent by approving the party house ordinance. The City Attorney’s Office is seeking to enjoin Nightfall and the property owners from further harming the public through the continued violation and public nuisances. The City Attorney’s Office is also seeking penalties of up to $2,500 for each violation of each ordinance.