446 A.2d 1084 | Conn. Super. Ct. | 1982
The defendant tenants have appealed from a judgment for the plaintiff landlord in a summary process action seeking possession of leased premises for the nonpayment of rent.
The defendants raised three issues on appeal: (1) whether the notice to quit complied with statutory standards; (2) whether the trial court considered the applicability of the equitable doctrine against forfeiture; and (3) whether the trial court erred in excluding evidence bearing on the defendants' financial difficulties prior to executing the lease and option with the plaintiff.
The facts are not seriously disputed: On August 9, 1978, the defendants, in order to avoid foreclosure of their home, sold it to the plaintiff. Simultaneously, the parties executed a two-year lease with five two-year option periods exercisable by the defendants. Additionally, an option to repurchase the property was granted, applying, as a credit toward the purchase price, a portion of the paid rental installments.
A continuing default in rental payments from July, 1979, to March, 1980, caused the plaintiff to secure a judgment for possession in a previous summary process action. In settlement of that litigation, the parties entered into an agreement reinstating the original *343 lease and extending it to August 31, 1982. Some minor modifications of the lease were negotiated but they are of no moment in this litigation.
The defendants failed to tender the rental installment for the month of January, 1981. Upon expiration of the thirty-day grace period, as provided in the lease, the plaintiff served a notice to quit on the defendants on February 4, 1981, demanding that the premises be vacated on February 13.
It is fundamental that the essential prerequisite for a successful summary process is the proper delivery of a sufficient notice to quit. O'Keefe v. Atlantic Refining Co.,
The admonition serves two useful purposes. It avoids misleading tenants who tender late payments and it insulates the summary process action from being flawed by the acceptance of rent after commencement of the summary process. Borst v. Ruff
The defendants' contention is that a plaintiff who continues to claim rights under a lease cannot initiate a summary process action based on termination of the lease. The argument is faulty. The defendants confuse the termination of a lease with its abandonment. A landlord's termination of a tenant's possessory rights, based on breach of a rental covenant, will not be construed as a waiver of the landlord's rights under a lease. Club Road Corporation v. Whitehead,
The issue of equitable relief against forfeiture was raised through the third special defense. To determine whether the trial court considered equitable nonforfeiture, we look to the memorandum of decision. In the absence of a finding, the trial court's memorandum of decision now becomes the basis to test the court's conclusions. Practice Book 3060B; see Cervantes v. Administrator,
In its memorandum of decision, the trial court clearly addressed and considered the equitable doctrine against forfeiture. It reviewed at length the equitable principles set down in Thompson v. Coe, supra, and their application to summary process by virtue of Steinegger v. Fields, supra. After extensive review of the evidence and the factual basis of its decision, *346 the trial court concluded that "the equities here are more clearly with the plaintiff." Additionally, the trial court found no unusual or exigent circumstances, or accidents or interventions by third parties to cause the rental default. It concluded that the defendants were unable to meet the financial burden of owning or occupying this property and that equity did not require that the plaintiff repeatedly forego what were clearly his rights under the lease, the option and chapter 830 of the General Statutes.
We must not be unmindful that the purpose of summary process is to provide an expeditious remedy to a landlord in order to remove a holdover tenant. Prevedini v. Mobil Oil Corporation,
There are no special elixirs which trigger the extraordinary remedies of equity. Each party seeking equitable relief in the summary process action is required to prove the necessity for invoking the powers of equity. The doctrine against forfeiture cannot be dilatorily invoked to eviscerate the statutory mandates of our summary process laws. Under circumstances, however, where the conscience is shocked or the forfeiture unconscionable, the doctrine against forfeiture should be an available shield to the tenant. Nicoli v. Frouge Corporation, supra.
The defendants have neither attacked the facts found nor requested a further articulation. Practice Book 3082. We find that the trial court's conclusions are legally correct and supported by the facts set out in the memorandum. Pandolphe's Auto Parts, Inc. v. Manchester,
The defendants attack the court's ruling sustaining an objection which excluded testimony relating to the defendants' financial circumstances leading to foreclosure proceedings antedating August 9, 1978.2
Although the objection was offered on remoteness, the trial court sustained it on the basis of the parol evidence rule. The trial court's reason for sustaining the objection is of no consequence since the ruling itself was correct. Tait LaPlante, Handbook of Connecticut Evidence 3.4; see Bradbury v. South Norwalk,
The excluded inquiry sought to elicit the causes of the defendants' foreclosure, the history of this property and their involvement in it. No offer of proof was submitted nor grounds stated upon which the question was claimed. Practice Book 288; Tait LaPlante, supra. No proof was offered that the plaintiff was either connected to the foreclosure or contributed *348 to the defendants' financial distress. The trial court could only speculate as to the connection between the failure to pay the January, 1981 rent and the events leading up to the foreclosure in 1978. The record joining this plaintiff with the defendants' financial failures either in 1978, or 1981, is barren.
The defendants' claim that the excluded question was an attempt "to put the equities before the court" is insufficient to invoke the protective shield of equity. Parties seeking the mitigating beneficence of equity are required to assert the grounds upon which equity ought to intervene. Absent this, the trial court is not properly alerted. 27 Am.Jur.2d, Equity 19, p. 541; see Casalo v. Claro,
The question was properly excludable as remote. "Generally speaking the question of remoteness, as justifying the exclusion of evidence, must depend upon all the considerations, including time, the character of the evidence, and all the surrounding circumstances which in the opinion of the court ought to have a bearing upon its worthiness to be brought into consideration and determination of the matter in contention." Holden Daly, Connecticut Evidence 67d, p. 217; see Steiber v. Bridgeport,
We cannot hold, in view of the evidence and pleadings in the whole record, that the trial court's ruling was clearly erroneous. Collette v. Collette,
There is no error.
In this opinion DALY and COVELLO, Js., concurred.