Court proceedings in Frank Theatres case now dissolved

BLACKSBURG, Va. – Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Marc Long dissolved a prior order Monday,  the emergency injunction that allowed Frank Theatres to regain access to the facility last month.

Patrick Callahan, who is representing property owners Blacksburg APF Partners, will ask that the unlawful detainer action, the beginning of the eviction process, be dismissed.

Monday afternoon's event follows Frank Theatres paying $670,000 in back rent and fees since it was shut out of the Blacksburg CineBowl & Grille April 25.

Blacksburg APF Partners' attorneys say they believe there are continuing issues of default, but there are landlord tenant disputes they believe can be resolved.

Frank Theatres asked the court to return the $80,000 bond it paid in order to regain access. Lawyer Greg Habeeb, representing the theater, immediately turned it over to be applied to June's rent. 

After the hearing, Habeeb said the reality is that this was not an abnormal commercial transaction.

"There are all kinds of reasons in commercial transactions were parties have disagreements. All of that has been resolved. So the why and how it got there really isn't relevant at this point. What matters is these parties diligently work together to reach a resolution. They did," he said.

Attorney Jeff Mitchell, representing the property owners disagreed.

"I think it's something of a challenge to say the landlord dispute that got this far is normal in terms of the amount but we think the actions that have been taken are very positive and we think the tenants and its representatives are aggressively working to make sure it doesn't happen again."