New-York tribune., 1921-02-08
Tenants Criticize
Municipal Court;
Demand Inquiry
Form Bronx Organization
and Announce Petition
Will Be Circulated Asking
Justice She'll to Resign

Delegates from several tenants as
sociations formed the Federation of
Tenants Associations last night at a
meeting at Public School 54, 196th
Street and Bainbridge Avenue, the
Bronx. The new association adopted
resolution requesting the Appellate Di-
vision of the Supreme Court to investi-
gate the conduct of justices of the
Municipal Court and Of attorneys prac-
tcing iii those courts.
The resolution was adopted follow
ing a complaint made by Mrs S. J.
Lesem, of 294 West Ninety-second
SWeet, who said she had not been
treated fairly in the Municipal Court.
Her landlord, she said, had called her
to court half a dozen times in an
effort to collect rent which was 90 per
cent higher than that she had paid the
previous year.
Justice Frederick Spiegelberg, of the
Municipal Court, dismissed the action,
she said, after hearings had been ad-
journed in his court several times, and
the landlord renewed the suit before
Justice Peter A. She'll in the Bronx.
The landlord was seeking to obtain a
rent of $3.50, Mrs. Lesem said, and
had refused to accept deposits of 500
month which she had made with the
court.
Justice She'll, she asserted without
listening to her side of the story, fixed
her rent at $4,000 and told her that
she must pay at that rate from Octo-
Der 1, 1920.
Numerous tenants criticized the de-
-cisions made in the Municipal Court,
especiallyfn the Bronx, saying that the
justices seemed to favor the landlords.
Both the Republican and the Demo-
cratic parties were denounced.
Delegates asserted that they would
start circulating a petition in the Bronx
to-day requesting Justice She'll to re-
sign, and would try to get it before
all rent payers in the Bronx for sig
nature.
There were more than one hundred
delegates at the meeting. They repre-
sented the Fair Play Rent Association,
the fremont Tenants League, the Riv-
erside Welfare League, the Kleban
Leader Tenants Association and sew
eral smaller organizations in the
Bronx.
fremont Tenants Association, was
elected president of the new organiza-
ton; Walter W. Ife, Of the Fair Play
Rent Association, vice-pre sident; Mrs
). D. McDerm oft, of the Riverside We'll
fare League, recording secretary, and
?. J. Farwell, secretary-treasurer.
Characterizing her remarks as sun
kind and untrue" Justice She'll, at his
home, 3239 Oinville Avenue, last night
denied that he had directed Mrs Lessen
to pay an exorbitant increase in rent.
81 recall the case," said Justice Shell,
and | have no scruples about it, When
Mrs. LESSEN says that shewas accorded
no trial whatever, and that fixed her
rent at $4,000 without listening to her
side of the story, she is stating some
thing that is not so.
cat the time 1 offered,to adjourn the
case to permit her to obtain counsel,
but she said she didn't want to come
to court again. SO I fixed her rent at
the same figure as that of the other
tenants in the apartment house. Her
remarks, therefore, are unkind and un-
true. The fact of the matter is that it
is giddy whirl all the time UP here,
with so many landlord and tenant
cases clutterng up the calendar, and
we simply have to do the best we can"