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Discriminatory Housing Advertisements On-Line: Lessons From Craigslist, Rigel C. Oliveri Jan 2010

Discriminatory Housing Advertisements On-Line: Lessons From Craigslist, Rigel C. Oliveri

Faculty Publications

The Fair Housing Act makes it illegal to publish discriminatory housing advertisements. This has long been applied to newspapers, which have effectively screened all discriminatory housing ads from sight. However, in 1996 Congress created a loophole when it immunized website operators from liability for the content posted to their sites by third parties. Without publisher liability, websites have no incentive to screen out discriminatory housing ads. The result is that such ads are proliferating in cyberspace.While this situation is problematic from a fair housing standpoint, it presents a valuable opportunity. For the first time in a generation discriminatory housing advertisements …


Is Acquisition Everything? Protecting The Rights Of Occupants Under The Fair Housing Act, Rigel C. Oliveri Jan 2008

Is Acquisition Everything? Protecting The Rights Of Occupants Under The Fair Housing Act, Rigel C. Oliveri

Faculty Publications

This article addresses a recent trend among the federal courts to deny housing discrimination claims under the Fair Housing Act in cases where the plaintiff was an occupant of the housing at the time the discrimination occurred. Put another way, the courts have begun to read the FHA as protecting only the right to obtain housing, not the right to occupy that housing free of discrimination.The trend began with a 2004 Seventh Circuit opinion authored by Judge Richard Posner in the case of Halprin v. The Prairie Single Family Homes. Halprin dismissed most of the claims of a Jewish couple …