repairs in comparison to the costs of privately hired contractors. During the failure of heat, hot
water, and electricity, respondent was instructed by petitioner's agent as to the address to the
address he should use for payments to petitioner towards arrears that might have been owed at
the time petitioner acquired the Building. The rent ledger placed in evidence by petitioner shows
no such payments. Finally, eleven days after the first appearance in the HP action, and after
respondent refused an offer of money to vacate the Apartment that was made during the
pendency of the HP action, petitioner served the Termination Notice.
What the chronology of events demonstrates is an escalating pattern of conscious
acts aided by the fortuitous circumstance of multiple and simultaneous utility failures, which
together constituted an increasingly strong disincentive to remain in the Apartment. When
respondent, instead of vacating the Apartment, involved the courts and sought correction of the
violations that existed there, petitioner elected to serve a termination notice, formulating that
intention on the same date that HPD inspected the Building. While petitioner urges that the court
find that petitioner formulated the intention to serve the termination notice prior to respondent's
complaints to HPD, petitioner offers no documentary or testimonial evidence to support that
contention; petitioner's only submission is inconsistent with that assertion. No member of the
LLC testified, and petitioner elected neither to present rebuttal testimony and no physical or
documentary evidence offered by petitioner overcomes the defense. In the absence of any such
testimony or evidence, the court concludes that petitioner failed to rebut the presumption of