1443 York Ave. Realty Co. v Ronning (2006 NY Slip Op 51401(U))

1443 York Ave. Realty Co. v Ronning

2006 NY Slip Op 51401(U) [12 Misc 3d 142(A)]

Decided on July 20, 2006

Appellate Term, First Department

Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431.

This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the printed Official Reports.

1443 York Avenue Realty Co., Plaintiff-Respondent,

against

Nancy Ronning, Defendant-Appellant. Kristen Ronning, Virginia Ronning and Nancy Ronning, Plaintiffs-Appellants, 1443 York Avenue Realty Co., Robert Giladian, Khalil Noghreh, and Silver Arm Realty, Defendants-Respondents-Cross-Appellants.

In consolidated actions, 1443 York Avenue Realty Co., plaintiff in action number 1 and one of several defendants in action number 2, appeals from that portion of an order of the Civil Court, New York County (Eileen A. Rakower, J.), entered May 12, 2003, which denied its cross motion to dismiss the complaint in action number 2 for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Nancy Ronning, defendant in action number 1 and one of several plaintiffs in action number 2, and Kristen Ronning and Virginia Ronning, the remaining plaintiffs in action number 2, appeal, as limited by their brief, from so much of the aforesaid order as denied their motion for summary judgment on the complaint in action number 2.

Order (Eileen A. Rakower, J.), entered May 12, 2003, reversed, without costs, merits determinations vacated, and matter remanded to Civil Court for entry of an order transferring the consolidated actions to Supreme Court, New York County.

Action number 1 was commenced by the building owner, 1443 York Avenue Realty Co. (realty company), to recover rent allegedly due under a guarantee executed by Nancy Ronning in connection with the residential tenancy of her daughters, Kristen Ronning and Virginia Ronning. The Ronnings thereafter instituted a plenary action (action number 2) against the realty company, its management firm, and the firm's individual representatives seeking to recover rent overcharges in the sum of $25,000, with "treble damages pursuant to statute to $75,000." By so-ordered stipulation, the parties agreed to consolidate the two actions "for all purposes," under a single index number. The parties cross- moved for varied relief, with the realty company and its affiliates arguing, convincingly in our view, that Civil Court lacked authority to adjudicate the rent overcharge claim seeking treble damages totalling $75,000.

A demand for treble damages, much like a demand for punitive damages, is parasitic in nature and does not constitute a separate cause of action distinct from the substantive cause upon which it is grounded (see generally Rocanova v Equitable Life Assoc. Soc., 83 NY2d 603, 616-617 [1999]). Inasmuch as the rent overcharge complaint pleaded not separate, distinct claims, but a single cause of action in excess of the court's $25,000 monetary ceiling (see CCA 202; S.S.I.G. Realty Inc.v Bologna Holding Corp., 213 AD2d 617, 619 [1995]), the court was without subject matter jurisdiction over the matter (see Kemper v Transamerica Ins. Co., 61 Misc 2d 7 [1969]). In such circumstances, the proper course was to transfer the consolidated actions to Supreme Court pursuant to Article VI, Section 19(f) of the New York State Constitution (Eastrich No. 80 Corp. v Patrolmen's Benevolent Assn., 180 Misc 2d 98, 99 [1999]; see also Atherton v 21 E. 92nd St.Corp.,149 AD2d 354,355 [1989]).

This constitutes the decision and order of the court.
I concur I concur
Decision Date: July 20, 2006