It is difficult to understand what drove Warren Estis and Jeffrey Turkel to write "Succession Rights: Attack of the Zombie Tenants," and the Law Journal to publish this mean-spirited, scurrilous and misleading diatribe. For more than 20 years, I have reviewed all reported and many unreported tenancy succession cases. I publish an annual update and have written a number of law review articles analyzing and critiquing these cases. Thousands of families have been protected from eviction, which is the public policy underlying the enactment of the succession regulations and statute, and their expansion in Braschi v. Stahl Assocs., 74 N.Y.2d 201 (1989). To suggest that these families can be accurately, or indeed humanely, described as "zombies" or "opportunistic" is outrageous. Even in the vast majority of cases in which respondents have not prevailed (a number of which were, I believe, wrongly decided), they raised legitimate, colorable claims.
Estis and Turkel cite the usual line of cases noted by those who oppose rent-regulation, which at best demonstrate that some claims were ultimately found to be meritless and the landlord prevailed. Rejecting any attempt to be balanced, however, they refuse to consider the thousands of frivolous or, at least, unnecessary cases brought by landlords in which respondents prevailed (sometimes on summary judgment) and in which there was no real dispute that the long-term surviving family member was entitled to succession. In those cases, numerous elderly, disabled and sick tenants were put through unnecessary stress and expense by, dare I say, "zombie opportunistic" landlords hoping that the tenants, often unrepresented, would not be able to establish their claim at trial and the landlord could then deregulate a regulated apartment and reap huge profits.
