Case Study

Landlord in a Fire-Stricken Building, Insulated from Former Tenants’ Attack

When a landlord innocently suffered a devastating fire in its building, it found itself having to turn to Adam Leitman Bailey, P.C. for protection from its former tenants who were seeking not only to recover their property from an unsafe building, but to exploit opportunities to coerce the landlord into undeserved buyouts. The Adam Leitman Bailey, P.C. staff stepped in and crafted the agreements necessary to give the client full protection against these attempted power grabs. The tenants were forced to retrieve their property under controlled conditions and numerous tenants peaceably relinquished not only their claims to their personal property, but to their tenancies, freeing up the property for more lucrative development.

When the tenants realized the consequences of their actions they brought suit where they were rebuffed in New York State Supreme Court and again found their claims rejected in the Appellate Division. The court found that the landlord’s attempt to categorize what property was salvageable did not violate its obligations to allow the tenants to recover the surviving property.

At the trial level, the landlord was represented by Christopher Halligan and Dov Treiman and on appeal by Jeffrey Metz.