Lending & Foreclosure
Verified Update
Ruling Issued
A Milwaukee County judge approved the sale of Southridge Mall from a Simon affiliate to a receiver-linked buyer assuming the $101.9 million loan and paying $7 million in cash, ending a CMBS foreclosure.
On October 6, 2026, a Milwaukee County Circuit Court judge entered an order approving the sale of Southridge Mall in Greendale, Wisconsin. The sale ends a CMBS foreclosure that began in December 2020. The 560,000-square-foot mall core is going from a Simon Property Group affiliate to Southridge Mall Member LLC, a newly formed buyer tied to the court-appointed receiver. The buyer will assume the mall's $101.9 million loan and pay $7 million in cash.
$101.9 million loan assumption plus $7 million cash
Retail
Why it matters: The case shows how long a contested regional-mall foreclosure can take: almost six years from complaint to an approved sale, even after the borrower agreed to a foreclosure judgment in 2021. The structure is also notable. A receiver's affiliate buys the asset by assuming the securitized debt instead of the lender taking title or holding an open auction, which gives CMBS holders and special servicers a model for exiting long-stalled retail loans.
Oct 6, 2026
Wisconsin Circuit Court, Milwaukee County
Premises Liability
Verified Update
Filed
A victim's family sued Simon Property Group, HG Galleria and two security firms over a fatal June 3, 2025 shooting in a Houston Galleria garage, alleging banned suspects were not kept out. More than $1,000,000 sought.
The family of Anthony Sanders, a 30-year-old Marine Corps veteran shot and killed in a parking garage at Houston's Galleria mall on June 3, 2025, filed a negligent-security suit in Harris County District Court against Simon Property Group, HG Galleria LLC, and security contractors Allied Universal Security Services and GardaWorld Security Services, along with the individuals accused of the shooting. The complaint's central allegation is that the two suspects had previously been banned from the mall -- and were captured on video being removed by security more than once, including the day before the fatal shooting -- yet the property had no system in place to actually keep banned individuals out.
More than $1,000,000 sought
Why it matters: Shifts the negligent-security foreseeability inquiry away from a property's general crime history and onto something more concrete and harder for a defendant to dismiss at the pleading stage: whether a mall enforced its own previously-issued bans against the specific individuals who went on to commit the violence. Any commercial property that maintains a formal trespass/ban list -- malls, casinos, large retail centers -- should treat the case as a reason to audit whether its ban-enforcement process (facial recognition, security briefings, access-control flags) actually functions in practice, not just on paper.
Sep 3, 2026
Harris County District Court, Texas
Zoning & Land Use
Verified Update
Ruling Issued
The Second Circuit upheld Nassau County's $4.8 million fine on Roosevelt Field Mall's Simon-affiliated owner for skipping two years of required income and expense filings, rejecting an excessive-fines claim.
The Second Circuit affirmed a $4.8 million fine Nassau County imposed on The Retail Property Trust, the Simon Property Group-affiliated owner of Roosevelt Field Mall, for failing to file two consecutive years of mandatory financial disclosures under the County's Annual Statement of Income and Expense (ASIE) Law. The panel held the value-linked penalty was not grossly disproportional under the Eighth Amendment's Excessive Fines Clause given the property's value and the owner's willful, repeated noncompliance, affirming summary judgment for the County out of the Eastern District of New York.
$4.8M cumulative fine for two years of non-compliance
Why it matters: Confirms that municipalities can tie escalating disclosure penalties directly to a commercial property's assessed value and have those penalties survive constitutional scrutiny, even at multimillion-dollar levels, so long as noncompliance is willful and repeated. A separate opinion questioning whether corporations can invoke the Excessive Fines Clause at all signals an unresolved issue that could shape how commercial owners contest other value-linked regulatory fines going forward.
Aug 6, 2026
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
REIT & Securities
Verified Update
Filed
Simon Property Group co-founder Herb Simon sued his late nephew's family, alleging SFG Company LLC, a private real estate vehicle held outside the REIT, was dissolved and its assets moved without equity holders' consent.
Herb Simon, co-founder of Simon Property Group, sued his late nephew David Simon's family and 17 total defendants in Marion Superior Court, alleging David used his control as manager of SFG Manager LLC to unilaterally dissolve SFG Company LLC, a private real estate vehicle formed in 1995 to hold interests kept outside the public REIT, and transfer its assets to a new entity less than two weeks before his death on March 22, 2026. The complaint alleges the maneuver stripped Herb and other family equity holders of preferential interests without their notice or consent.
Undisclosed; dispute over equity interests in a privately held real estate holding company
Why it matters: Illustrates that privately held family real estate holding vehicles sitting outside a public REIT's own corporate structure can carry significant, largely invisible governance risk, and that an LLC manager's broad authority is not a license to restructure ownership unilaterally over a co-owner's objection. A cautionary example for family-controlled real estate enterprises of how manager-succession and consent-rights ambiguity can erupt into public litigation, particularly when a major restructuring is timed around a principal's terminal illness.
Jul 31, 2026
Marion Superior Court, Indiana
Premises Liability
Verified Update
On Appeal
The Indiana Supreme Court heard argument on whether Simon Property Group and its security contractor owed patrons a duty over the July 17, 2022 Greenwood Park Mall shooting, after lower courts refused to dismiss.
The Indiana Supreme Court heard oral argument on January 15, 2026 in the long-running negligent-security suit brought by shooting victim Kaya P.R. Stewart and her family against Greenwood Park Mall owner Simon Property Group, L.P. and its security contractor, Universal Protection Service, LLC (d/b/a Allied Universal Security Services), over the July 17, 2022 food-court mass shooting that killed three people. Both the Marion Superior Court and the Indiana Court of Appeals rejected the defendants' bids to dismiss the case, and the Supreme Court is now weighing the central question of whether a mass shooting at a shopping mall is foreseeable enough, as a matter of law, to support a negligent-security duty running from the mall owner and its security contractor to mall patrons.
Unspecified compensatory damages sought; underlying premises-liability and negligence claims
Why it matters: One of the most closely watched tests of the foreseeability element in mall and shopping-center negligent-security claims now pending before any state supreme court, with Indiana's status as an open-carry state adding a wrinkle the justices probed directly at argument. Whatever standard the Court adopts will shape how every commercial landlord and contracted security firm in Indiana litigates -- and insures against -- premises-liability exposure tied to third-party criminal acts, and is likely to be cited well beyond Indiana given how thin state supreme court authority remains on this exact question.
Jan 15, 2026
Supreme Court of Indiana
Commercial Lease Disputes
Verified Update
Pending
Developers of Oklahoma City's OAK project sued Simon Property Group, alleging it tied national lease terms to tenants avoiding OAK to protect Penn Square Mall; Simon's dismissal motion is pending.
Oak Land and Development LLC and other developers of OAK, a competing Oklahoma City mixed-use retail project, sued Simon Property Group in December 2025 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, alleging Simon illegally tied favorable lease terms across its national mall portfolio to tenants' agreement to avoid leasing space at OAK. The complaint alleges Simon used this leverage, plus direct threats and incentives, to block prospective tenants including restaurant chain North Italia from opening at OAK in favor of Simon's nearby Penn Square Mall. Simon has called the suit meritless and, in June 2026, moved to dismiss the amended complaint as an improper attempt to use antitrust law to shield OAK from ordinary competition; the motion remains pending.
Unspecified damages and injunctive relief sought over alleged antitrust tying
Why it matters: The case tests whether a dominant landlord's national portfolio leverage -- rather than any single lease term -- can itself support Sherman Act tying liability, a theory with particular relevance for REITs and mall owners with multi-market footprints. A ruling allowing the claims to proceed would signal materially higher antitrust exposure for large landlords using cross-portfolio concessions to influence tenant decisions in contested local submarkets.
Dec 3, 2025
U.S. District Court, Western District of Oklahoma
