Evicting Tenant in Jail for a Drug Related Offense

Quote:

---

Quoting JulesJam

---

You have no proof and you are taking legal advice from a non-lawyer cop. Bad idea. You risk civil liability if the cops made a bad arrest.

---

You don't help yourself when you compound your nonsensical belief that a tenant cannot be evicted for criminal activity before the tenant is convicted, with your even more bizarre notion that a landlord bringing such an eviction case could "risk civil liability" if the tenant prevails in an eviction action flowing from a major drug raid and arrest on the rented premises. If the landlord is unable to prove that the tenant's illegal activity rose to the level that justified eviction, the consequence is simply that the tenant doesn't get evicted.

Looks like we're gonna use professional eviction company to assist us in this matter, but before then a friend of a friend, who is a veteran in residential rental business, suggested we should look into the Abandonment route to save money since we'll have to evict 3 different households... I did some research and thought this is unwise because the premises are being 'temporarily unoccupied" due to unusual circumstance, not "abandoned", but then he's a veteran so he should know better than me... Do you think this would work? TIA

Abandonment is explained here,

Quote:

---

Quoting If your tenant seems to have moved out, even if you have not filed an eviction case in court

---

If rent is 14 or more consecutive days overdue and the landlord has good reason to believe that the tenant has moved out without letting the landlord know, this is called “abandonment.”

If this happens, the landlord can send the tenant a Notice of Belief of Abandonment that includes the name of the tenant and the address of the rental unit. It must also say that this is a “Notice of Belief of Abandonment” and say what date the landlord is ending the lease or rental agreement. The date must be at least 15 days after the landlord serves the notice in person, or 18 days after he or she serves the notice by mail. The landlord must also sign and date the notice.

The tenant has 15 days if served in person, or 18 days if served by mail, to send the landlord a response telling the landlord that he or she has not abandoned the premises, or to pay the landlord all or part of the rent that is owed.

If the tenant does not answer the notice, the landlord can move the tenant’s belongings out and rent the place to someone else without having to file an unlawful detainer case.

BUT the landlord must be very careful because if the rent was not overdue for 14 days, or he or she did not wait long enough for the tenant to answer, or he or she had no good reason to think that the tenant moved out, the tenant could sue the landlord for “wrongful eviction.”

---

See also the California Civil Code, Sec. 1951.3, here.

I'm not a lawyer.

There does not need to be a criminal burden of proof to evict a tenant for criminal activity at least is NYS. However, the housing court judge does demand appropriate evidence before evicting. The strongest evidence is, of course, a conviction. However, a conviction is not necessarily a requirement in a housing court case. What other evidence do you have? Do you have access to any video of the raid? Also, you may wish to take a trip to the criminal court, copy the records (such as arrest reports, list of inventory seized, arresting officer statements, etc) and use it as part of your evidence. If it's a federal case, go to the court or obtain some of the documents online. You may also subpoena the officers that conducted the raid to get them to testify as to what they observed in the apt. How about getting victims (if any) of the tenant to testify. You may also secure the tenant's criminal background report as the tenant may have a history of similar crimes that places your property and other tenants in danger. A combination of evidence to paint a comprehensive picture for the judge would help.

Some localities, including in NYS, do require the landlord to take action when it knows of criminal activity on the premises. There was one case when there were multiple allegations of drug use in an apt and multiple drug raids and the landlord was eventually sued by the locality because they thought landlord was allowing this to occur. However, the landlord actually already started a case against the tenant probably about a year before and that case was still ongoing at the time of the lawsuit. The locality was notified of the existing court case against the tenant and nothing ever happened after that and the tenant was eventually evicted.

Most of that would be... overkill. In any event, the OP has hired a professional to handle the eviction case. Odds are the defendants, who if you recall are facing criminal charges, will default.

It is not overkill depending on your locality. Housing court judges in some localities may not require as much evidence to evict, however, housing court judges in other localities where they are very pro-tenant, such as in NYC, are much less likely to approve an eviction unless the evidence is very strong. My philosophy is, the more evidence provided, the better, especially when dealing with judges that are much more pro-tenant. Also, the more evidence provided, the less likely the case will be dragged out.