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DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW — NOT FINAL

601 West 160 Realty Corp. v. Henry, 183 Misc. 2d 666 (2000)

Citation
601 West 160 Realty Corp. v. Henry, 183 Misc. 2d 666 (2000)
Parent Document
601 West 160 Realty Corp. v. Henry, 183 Misc. 2d 666 (2000)
Jurisdiction
New York (state)
Effective Date
2000-02-09

Full Text

1,364 chars
Real Property Law § 223-b creates a rebuttable presumption that the landlord’s acts are retaliatory, except that the rebut-table presumption does not apply to a proceeding based on the nonpayment of rent or other violation of the terms of the lease agreement. (Real Property Law § 223-b [5].) In the case at bar, wherein the alleged lease violation, i.e., nonpayment of rent, is unequivocally a baseless allegation manufactured by petitioner to evict and harass the tenant in three separate summary proceedings over a three-year period, the court finds that this is precisely the type of landlord behavior the statutory defense and presumption was enacted by the Legislature to combat. The legislation was drafted and passed specifically to protect tenants’ activities in a tenants’ association, among other delineated tenant acts, from retaliatory eviction. The bill was enacted to restore a balance in landlord-tenant relationships, and to ensure that landlords will not have an unfair advantage *672over tenants, either in their homes or in courts of law. (Mem in Support, Bill Jacket, L 1979, ch 693.) Respondent Henry is, therefore, afforded the protection of the statutory presumption. However, it is clear that based on all the credible evidence, the respondent would be successful on bis retaliatory eviction counterclaim without the statutory presumption.