Case ID: nys_64/html/1111-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "SCHUOHMAN, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

HAYS et al. v. HAFFEN et al.
    (City Court of New York,
    General Term.
    May 28, 1900.)
    Action for Rent—General Denial—Condemnation Proceedings—Error.
    In an action for rent plaintiff alleged and proved the leasing and occupancy of the premises. The defendant, under a general denial, introduced in evidence condemnation proceedings of the premises in question. Held error, as the condemnation proceedings should have been pleaded.
    Appeal from special term.
    Action for rent by David Hays and Anna Hobbs, executors of Marietta H. Hull, deceased, against John Haffen and another. From a judgment in favor of defendants, plaintiffs appeal.
    Reversed.
    Argued before FITZSIMONS, C. J., and SCHUCHMAN, J.
    Rufus L. Scott, for appellants.
    Max D. Steuer, for respondents.
   SCHUOHMAN, J.

On this appeal we are confined to questions of law raised by the exceptions. On motion of defendants, a $150 item for rental set up in the complaint was dismissed from consideration by the court. In relation to this item the complaint alleges that Mrs. Hull, on or about April, 1894, leased premises at southeast corner of 130th street and Third avenue to the defendants as tenants by the month, at a rental of $250 per month; that the defendants continued in the possession of said premises until January, 1898; that the amount of rental was reduced from time to timé to $150; that the defendants paid to Mrs. Hull and these plaintiffs the rent up to December 1, 1897, but have not paid the rent for the month of December, 1897. The answer is a general denial. The proofs submitted at the trial show that Mrs. Hull in April, 1894, told Mr. Haffen, one of the defendants, that she could not give him a lease on account of the city taking the property, but she would give it to him as long as she had possession of it at $250 per month; that Mr. Haffen said, “I will take it;” that Haffen entered into possession of the premises, and continued therein until January 1, 1898, paying rent promptly, which rent was $250, gradually reduced to $150, but failing to pay the rent for the month of December, 1897. These proofs, standing uncontradicted, entitled the plaintiffs to judgment for this $150 item; and the granting of the motion dismissing the complaint as to this item, which was duly excepted to by the plaintiffs, was an error. It is true that the defendants, to prove nonliability for the rent of the month of December, 1897, introduced at the trial certain condemnation proceedings instituted by the city authorities in the supreme court in November, 1897; but the admission thereof in evidence was strenuously objected to throughout the trial by plaintiffs on the ground that they were not pleaded, and the overruling of the objections was duly excepted to. Such matter of defense must be pleaded. Lodge v. Martin, 31 App. Div. 13, 52 N. Y. Supp. 385.

Judgment appealed from reversed, and new trial granted, with costs to appellants to abide the event.

FITZSIMONS, O. J., concurs.