Ayers v. Landow, 666 A.2d 51 (1995)

Citation: Ayers v. Landow, 666 A.2d 51 (1995)
Parent Document: Ayers v. Landow, 666 A.2d 51 (1995)
Jurisdiction: DC (municipal)
Effective Date: 1995-10-02
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2381535/ayers-v-landow/ ↗

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The trial court suggested a potential problem that could arise in a different set of circumstances if we read “within” in § 45-1406 to denote a point of finality. The court posed a scenario where, under this interpretation, a landlord could mail a notice on January first and then post in June, or worse yet, initiate a prophylactic mailing to all his tenants, and then post months later on any tenants that the landlord still wishes to evict. Setting aside the fact that in any case, a landlord needs a legally sufficient reason to evict a tenant, it is true that the statute alone would not render this process of notice insufficient. However, the constitutional requirements of Greene clearly would. A mailing that was prophylactic or that occurred months prior to posting would certainly not be “reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise interested parties of the pendency of the action.” Greene, supra, 456 U.S. at 449-50, 102 S.Ct. at 1878 (emphasis omitted). This is especially the case if the tenant can show that the landlord was simply trying to avoid the spirit of Greene. Therefore, I am not convinced that interpreting the service statute to permit the notice in this ease could have the unintended consequence of allowing a landlord to comply with the language, but not the spirit, of the statute, under different circumstances. Guided by due process requirements, courts will always be able to protect tenants in such cases.

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