In the first of two cases, TOV Realty LLC attorney Ian G. Gottlieb of GLG Law LLC said a superior court judge incorrectly stayed a summary process eviction in Hartford by acknowledging a cease-and-desist order from that city's fair rent commission. According to Gottlieb, commissions can issue cease-and-desist orders only to block certain acts of landlord retaliation. Retaliation doesn't include eviction when a tenant stops paying rent, he argued, citing Section 47a-20 of the Connecticut General Statutes.
Justice Andrew J. McDonald asked whether TOV retaliated by seeking eviction after the tenant complained to the fair rent commission. Gottlieb said TOV sought eviction over nonpayment of rent, not because of the complaint.
The case involves a tenant who signed a $1,050-a-month lease containing a reduction to $700 a month for several months, Gottlieb indicated. When those concessions expired, the tenant refused to pay the full $1,050 and sought protection from the rent commission, he said. TOV sought possession under a summary process designed to quickly evict tenants, but a trial court judge stayed the ejection process, according to Gottlieb.
"The court ceded its authority to hear that summary process case," Gottlieb said.
"Our position is that the court had to hear the summary process case because the tenant had all available defenses," he added.
Justice McDonald said the court's stay contained no reasoning and TOV should have asked for details.
"Under our case law, that's a basis for us not to review this claim," the justice added.
Gottlieb said he understood that possible consequence. He claimed the commission had no power to freeze rent while evictions proceed and said if TOV won, the administrative rent challenge would vanish because there would be no rental agreement left to dispute.
Arguing for tenant Angel Suarez, Douglas H. Butler of Greater Hartford Legal Aid said a ruling in TOV's favor would render the commission a "gutless administrative body" because its jurisdiction would be severed whenever a landlord files an eviction lawsuit.
Justice McDonald urged Butler to explain whether the Legislature created a gap between the rent commission system and superior court summary eviction actions, or whether there was any way "to bridge the two systems so that they work cohesively well."
"Section 47a-20 says that once a fair rent commission appeal is filed, contrary to what plaintiff argued, rent shall not be increased," Butler said.
He said Suarez paid, and TOV accepted, $700 for each of four months after the increase was due. Suarez claims he couldn't make a fifth installment because TOV blocked him from a payment portal, possibly due to an acceleration clause that sought $3,000, the full rent left under the contract, while legal proceedings unfolded.
Justice Steven D. Ecker suggested an appeal of the commission's findings could have been consolidated with the eviction action. Butler said he sought consolidation, but his requests went nowhere.
Justice Ecker also asked Butler whether it was unfair for TOV to receive $350 less per month while the tenant's complaints were tied up in hearings. Butler said TOV should seek a deficiency judgment in small claims court if it prevails.
In the second of two cases heard Monday morning, landlord Kosel Equity LLC, also represented by Gottlieb, said a trial court judge was wrong to allow the Middletown Fair Rent Commission to step into a summary process eviction in that jurisdiction.
"No reported Connecticut decision has addressed whether a municipal fair rent commission may intervene into a pending summary process action and thereby seek to affect the superior court's exclusive, original jurisdiction over possession," Kosel argued in a Connecticut Supreme Court brief.
Justice William H. Bright Jr. asked whether the commission could prevent Kosel from "racing to court" to file an eviction lawsuit rather than an administrative appeal of the commission's rent decision.
Gottlieb said Section 47a-20a controls summary process actions. He accused the commission of issuing "a blanket cease-and-desist tethered to nothing but their own order," in contravention of the statute.
"That may be a good reason why they're wrong and you're right, maybe," Justice Ecker responded. "But don't they get to argue their side of the claim?"
Gottlieb said the commission's interests were similar to the tenant's and that the commission slowed the case.
Arguing for the commission, Philip G. Kent of Brenner Saltzman & Wallman LLP said the case arose when Kosel committed "several illegal acts and maneuvers."
"Kosel retaliated against the tenant for filing a complaint with the commission and then tried to take 35% more rent from that same tenant," Kent said.
He accused Kosel of attempting to "eradicate fair rent commissions statewide" by seeking a supreme court opinion in the landlord's favor.
"This case is about the substantial, cognizable interest of a municipal authority in its legislatively mandated integrity, and sustaining its concurrent jurisdiction with the trial courts over retaliation stemming from complaints," Kent said.
Noting the commission was not the aggrieved party, Justice McDonald asked why it sought to dismiss the eviction case.
Kent said that if the summary eviction process advanced, the commission's retaliation findings would be "completely ignored" and "the entire legislative scheme that created fair rent commissions is completely eviscerated."
Representing tenant Mark MacGregor, Jane Kelleher of Connecticut Legal Services Inc. defended the commission's entry, saying most Connecticut tenants are still not represented by counsel in legal proceedings.
She said Kosel should have exhausted its administrative remedies before the commission. Only when those proceedings ended should it have tried to kick MacGregor out of his apartment via a summary eviction, Kelleher argued.
"The Fair Rent Commission Act was established many, many years after our summary process statutes were put into place, and the statutes refer back to each other, back and forth," she said. "The Legislature did attempt to create a cohesive framework for dealing with situations such as these."
TOV and Kosel are represented by Ian G. Gottlieb, David E. Rosenberg and Paul J. Small of GLG Law LLC.
Suarez is represented by Douglas H. Butler, Johannes Wetzel and Giovanna Shay of Greater Hartford Legal Aid.
MacGregor is represented by Jane Kelleher of Connecticut Legal Services Inc.
The Middletown Fair Rent Commission is represented by Philip G. Kent of Brenner Saltzman & Wallman LLP.
The cases are TOV Realty LLC v. Suarez, case number SC 21183, and Kosel Equity LLC v. MacGregor et al., case number SC 21184, in the Supreme Court of the State of Connecticut.
--Editing by Nick Siwek.
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