PUTTING A ‘STAY’ ON CASE

[NODEAL]

I was informed that in respect to my particular pending case in Housing Court, it may be a good idea for me to request that the judge “put a stay on my case as it can not go forward”. What exactly does this mean? What is the consequence of going this route? (The free advice only went so far.)

[TenantNet]

You can get good advice from the Tenants table in Housing Court, or the Pro Se attorney, also in Housing Court.

Various things can happen to cases once their in court. No means exhaustive...

adjourn ... the case is put off to a specified date/time in the future, by stip or by judicial order.

dismissed...

discontinued...

There are differences, but in both instances the case goes away, i.e., stops. But they can bring it again

trial or decision ... the case gets heard. Decision/Orders are often based on written papers where a motion is made, not necessarily a trial. A trial is where there are facts in dispute. A motion is usually based on a legal issue.

Taking a case "off calendar" might be what they were speaking about. This does not end the case, but essentially means there are no new dates that are set. A case can be put back on calender by agreement of the parties, by stip, or by a motion.

In your case, you said it "cannot go forward." Whatever that means, you might ask the judge to discontinue the matter.

[NODEAL]

CLARIFICATION

Thanks for your follow-up.

To clarify, the bulk of the money that my landlord is seeking from me
in Civil Court is the subject of a rent overcharge dispute (already filed with DHCR a few months ago).

Many months ago, the landlord demanded I pay the exuberant [in my view] amount and I refused to pay it. I offered the base rent,
for the time-being, until the DHCR resolves the matter but
she would not accept this payment.

Many months after my filing with DHCR (and while she has received no payment from me), she takes me to Civil Court for the entire amount (including the disputed overcharge).

She didn’t show up however in court and, the court granted her
an adjournment.

I was advised to ask the judge to “put a stay on my case as
it can not go forward” since DHCR is resolving it.
(Sorry, I didn’t think that these details were needed
to understand the inquiry and I tried to keep it short here.)

[TenantNet]

You can certainly ask the court to "discontinue without prejudice," but I would not get my hopes up. "Without prejudice" means the LL can bring the case again later.

Here, you chose DHCR as the forum for your overcharge complaint (which is one reason why many suggest tenants do not go to DHCR), but they have not yet issued an order. So at this time you have no legal basis for withholding rent. A judge might say that if and when DHCR issues and order, you can then withhold the rent (or file and collect a judgment), but until then they would look at the LL's case disregarding the overcharge claim. You can't have the issue heard in separate forums.

You could drop the DHCR case, opening up the court to deal with it. Whether or not it is wise to do this depends on the facts of your cases.

Also, if you have some other claims or defenses to rent that are separate from the overcharge case, you can raise those as defenses or counterclaims. For example, no heat and other issues dealing with bad conditions can be raised.

[NODEAL]

Thanks tenantnet for your follow-up.