Cuban American Mario EchevarrĂa. Photo: Belly of the Beast.
A Miami jury said Cuban American Mario EchevarrĂa and his family are owed close to $30 million (or possibly as much as $119.4 million total) from Expedia, Hotels.com, and Orbitz because they booked hotel rooms on an island off the coast of Cuba that he claims his family owned.
The lawsuit was made possible by Title III of the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, which allows U.S. claimants whose property was nationalized during the Cuban Revolution to sue companies for doing business on that property.
Title III was suspended by U.S. presidents for more than two decades to avoid upsetting U.S. allies whose companies can be sued under the law.
But Trump activated Title III for the first time in 2019. Since then, over 40 lawsuits have been filed against companies from more than a dozen countries, including many U.S. companies that did business in Cuba during Obama’s historic detente.
Trump’s activation of the Title III provision has been yet another deterrent for companies and investors who have steered clear of Cuba for fear of being dragged into court in the United States.
For more on Title III and the lobbying campaign that got Trump to implement the controversial law, check out our article Billboards and Backchannels and WATCH THIS VIDEO.
The only other Title III lawsuit to have received a favorable ruling was reversed by the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.
In 2023, Miami Judge Beth Bloom ruled that four cruise lines owed more than $400 million to Mickael Behn, the grandson of a telecommunications tycoon with Nazi ties who once held a lease over three docks in Havana used by the cruise ships. Behn’s company is asking the Supreme Court to review the appellate court’s decision.
The EchevarrĂa case was the first jury trial based on a Title III lawsuit. EchevarrĂa’s lawyers argued that his family had owned the property in question since the 19th Century. The property is Cayo Coco, an island on the northern coast of Cuba where resorts were built after the Cuban revolution.
The jury’s verdict might not last long.
The judge is considering a Rule 50 motion that could potentially lead to his overturning the verdict.
US-Funded Cuban Opposition Leaders Call for a Second Blockade Against the Island
U.S. District Judge Federico A. Moreno on Monday asked EchevarrĂa to provide evidence and arguments on a series of questions, including the calculation of damages, the differences in liability of each of the defendants, and “specific evidence showing exactly the proof of transfer of original ownership of Cayo Coco from the crown of Spain.”
Oral arguments on the motion were scheduled for the week of August 25.
Mario EchevarrĂa was born in Cuba and lived many years in Spain and later in the U.S., where he retired. He was a high-ranking executive of General Electric for decades.
In a recent interview, EchevarrĂa said he “adores” the late Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, who he claims “saved Spain.”
