SUNCOMPLAINTS.COM · FOUNDING CASE FILE
The La Costa Tree
La Costa Village, Port Orange, Florida · Status: resident account, unverified · Evidence collection in progress
The account
What follows is the account of Thomas Bowman Jr., a resident of La Costa Village, given to this project in October 2025 and published as his account. It has not been independently verified. Sun Communities is invited to respond; any substantive response will be published on this page.
Per the account: a tree in the community, half-dead, had been reported to management by a neighbor before anything happened. On a sunny, calm day — no storm — the tree collapsed. It struck parts of two homes. It nearly killed a woman, the wife of a military veteran.
Per the account: Sun reassured residents, and work crews with multiple trucks removed the tree within roughly twelve hours. The resident states the base of the tree was completely rotten, the roots rotted through, and the bark crumbled to dust in his hand — and states that he recorded video and photographs of the removal (publication pending receipt of the files).
Per the account: Sun then fixed nothing on either damaged home, denied responsibility, and claimed an act of God under Florida law — supported by the company's own in-house arborist, who maintained the tree had been fine. The couple whose home was struck sued. Then, per the account, they dropped the suit after their attorney told them they could not afford to fight a billion-dollar company.
Why this case leads the project
Every element is checkable or answerable: the date can be fixed; the weather that day is a public record; a filed-and-dropped lawsuit leaves a docket; a prior written report, if it exists, is the strongest form of legal notice. And the legal question is sharper than the denial suggests — Florida analyses generally reserve act-of-God treatment for healthy trees felled by storms, not for visibly dead trees the owner was told about. See "Act of God": The Dangerous-Maintenance Denial.
Still needed: the date of the collapse; the video and photo files; the veteran couple's own account (sought, with their consent); any written report of the tree made before the fall; the court docket of the dropped suit. If you witnessed this incident, your account matters — past and current residents are being interviewed now.
Sun Communities' response
None received yet. Sun Communities may respond to this case file at any time; a substantive response will be published here in full.