Section 45-1561

Citation: Section 45-1561
Parent Document: Habib v. Thurston, 517 A.2d 1 (1986)
Jurisdiction: DC (municipal)
Effective Date: 1986-10-30
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1995493/habib-v-thurston/ ↗

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By the time of a post-trial McNeal hearing, the court, without doubt, is ruling on a landlord’s supplementary, usually oral complaint for the rent due (or damages from a holdover tenant) during the litigation period, secured by the amount in the registry; and the tenant is defending, typically, with an oral defense of recoupment based on alleged housing code violations during that same period. Therefore, what began as a parallel, “equitable proceeding” effecting “no permanent disposition of property” pending resolution of the possessory action, Dameron, 431 A.2d at 584, has become a money claim — an action at law — for withheld rent (or unliquidated damages), answered by a Javins defense seeking an abatement. By this stage of the proceeding, the matter is perceived and treated, in effect, as a final accounting.18 Each party’s jury right, therefore, must be preserved.

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