Tenant Violated Ruling to Keep Sex Offender Out of Apartment

Landlord NYCHA terminated tenant's public housing tenancy after tenant violated a prior order to keep her son's father away from her apartment. The father was a convicted level 3 sex offender. Tenant filed an Article 78 appeal of NYCHA's decision and lost. At the hearing held before NYCHA, a police officer had testified that the father was found in a closet in tenant's apartment, after tenant denied that he was there. Tenant argued, for the first time in her appeal, that NYCHA violated her due process rights at the hearing because she wasn't informed that she could make a statement in mitigation. But even if the court considered that claim at this point, it had no merit. NYCHA's hearing notice to tenant stated that she had the right to make a statement in mitigation. And the hearing officer had no legal duty to explicitly invite tenant to present proof of what she thought was the appropriate penalty. The termination of the tenancy also didn't shock the court's sense of fairness. The lesser penalty of excluding the father imposed in a prior NYCHA proceeding didn't prevent the excluded person from entering the apartment. The father also disturbed neighboring tenants by exposing himself in the building hallway and masturbating in the elevator.

Grant v. NYCHA: NYLJ, 5/2/14, p. 27, col. 6 (App. Div. 1 Dept.; Gonzalez, PJ, Sweeny, Moskowitz, Richter, Clark, JJ)