DA files criminal charges against Century III, calls former mall a 'monument to blight’

The owners of the blighted Century III Mall were charged Tuesday in a move by Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala to seize ownership and demolish the once-mighty 1.3-million-square-foot building in West Mifflin.

The district attorney’s office charged Century III Mall Pa. LLC with causing or risking a catastrophe, a felony, and making a public nuisance, a misdemeanor, according to a criminal complaint.

The company, which has a Las Vegas address and previously had been identified as Moonbeam Capital, purchased the mall in a 2013 Sheriff’s sale for $10.5 million.

Under the charges and a restraining order filed Tuesday, Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas would take control of the nearly 90-acre site, Zappala said.

Zappala estimated that it might cost $12 million to $13 million to prepare the site for redevelopment. The cost of demolishing the mall — if the county takes control — would be reimbursed through the sale of the property, Zappala said.

“(The owners) clearly have no intention of doing anything … they have abandoned this property,” he said. “This is a monument to blight.”

A preliminary hearing on the criminal charges is scheduled for April 18 before Common Pleas Court Judge Christine Ward.

The mall’s owners — at least five individuals working under the names of multiple companies, Zappala said — could not be reached Tuesday for comment.

Once one of the most iconic malls of its kind nationwide, Century III has fallen dramatically into disrepair since its Las Vegas-based owner shuttered the property in 2019. JC Penney, the last retailer open at Century III Mall, closed its doors there in October 2020.

“Since that time, the buildings have deteriorated as a result of fire, deferred maintenance, a failing roof resulting in extensive water damage, portions of the existing garage decks collapsing, and maintenance and upkeep of the parking lots and driveways neglected,” Hanna Commercial Real Estate developer Kevin Langholz wrote to Zappala in a Jan. 26 letter. “The property has become a significant blight for the surrounding communities of this region.”

Zappala’s office provided the letter to reporters Tuesday.

West Mifflin police have received 177 calls for service at the Clairton Road site — including one time each for an injured juvenile and injured police officer — since February 2019, police Chief Greg McCulloch said in the complaint.

The Skyview Volunteer Fire Department has responded to the mall on 18 different occasions since 2018, according to the complaint. Those incidents ranged from alarm system issues to structure fires, the most recent of which took place on April 11, 2023 and required more than 100 firefighters to battle.

Allegheny County Deputy Chief Fire Marshal Donald Brucker told municipal leaders he took 400 to 500 photos of the site after the April 2023 fire detailing fire and water damage, mold, and broken glass inside the building, the complaint said.

Brucker called Century III Mall “a continuous fire hazard.” Structural engineer Gregory Wagner said the mall is “very dilapidated and distressed.”

A teenager fell through the roof of the mall, falling about 20 feet in a former Macy’s store, in June 2023.

“When people start falling through the roof, that got our attention,” Zappala said Tuesday. “This is like a zombie movie.”

Officials in West Mifflin have fined the mall’s owners for conditions there.

On Dec. 4, 2018, they hit the owners with an $80,000 fine for tall weeds on the property, the complaint said. A judge hit the owners of the shuttered mall with a $240,000 fine in July in response to the mall’s deteriorating condition — specifically, sanitation, unsafe structures, and weeds and high growth, court records show.

Zappala said Tuesday that the owners still owe $150,000 in fines to West Mifflin.

West Mifflin Mayor Chris Kelly joked with reporters Tuesday that his wife “wouldn’t let me retire until I got Century III off our plate.” Kelly said first responders have to gear up in HazMat suits to enter the mall.

“To finally see something positive means the world to me,” Kelly said.

The company that owns the mall previously had pledged to revitalize the site. Since closing, it has become dilapidated, structurally unsound and covered in graffiti. Numerous “Keep Out” signs pepper the site.

A demolition hearing had taken place in June.

Walter Anthony, West Mifflin’s community development director, told TribLive in 2023 that the municipality previously had tried to fine the site’s owners as a way of motivating them to do something with the mall.

“They’ve neglected to maintain the site or do anything, over several years, a long period of time,” Anthony said. “The borough was willing to work with them. But they’ve neglected to do anything.”

Less than two weeks after a fine was levied against the former mall, West Mifflin Council voted unanimously to condemn the building.

After that vote, Councilman Dan Davis conceded that the borough cannot afford a multimillion-dollar demolition of the property without state or federal funding. Razing the property was estimated to cost, at that time, about $15 million.

“We’re going to talk with the county,” Davis said. “We’re going to talk to our state representatives (and) our senators of PA, RIDC of Allegheny County and even (John) Fetterman and Summer Lee. … We can’t, in West Mifflin, take this on as a full demolition project. We’re not looking to do that. We want the building razed, but we don’t want to foot the bill for this.”