Yany's Garden LLC v. City of New York

MEMORANDUM & ORDER   Plaintiffs Yany’s Garden LLC (“Yany’s Garden”) and Narul Tony Hack bring this action against the City of New York (“NYC” or the “City”), the NYC Department of Buildings (“DOB”), the NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development (“HPD”), Rassoul Azarnejad, Amy Marcus, Philip Mattera,¹ and Dennis Zambotti (collectively, the “City Defendants”), and Scala Contracting Co. Inc. (“Scala”), NYCTL 2012-A Trust (“NYCTL”), the Bank of New York Mellon as Collateral Agent and Custodian for the NYCTL 2012-A Trust (“BNY” and, together with NYCTL, the “Trust”), and John Does 1-10. (See Am. Compl. (Dkt. 6).) Plaintiffs assert claims arising out of an emergency declaration, emergency repair work, a tax lien, and judgment of foreclosure and sale issued against Plaintiffs’ undeveloped property in Whitestone, Queens, New York (the “Property”) under 42 U.S.C. §1983 and various state law causes of action, including: Article 1, Section 6 of the New York Constitution, trespass, injury to property, wrongful conversion, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence, failure to protect, and illegal tax lien foreclosure. (See id.) Currently before the court are motions to dismiss Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint by the Trust and the City Defendants. (See Trust Mot. to Dismiss (“Trust Mot.”) (Dkt. 19); City Defs. Mot. to Dismiss (“City Defs. Mot.”) (Dkt. 20).) For the following reasons, the Trust Defendants’ motion is GRANTED and the City Defendants’ motion is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. I. BACKGROUND A. Facts The court takes the following statement of facts largely from Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint, the well-pleaded allegations of which the court generally accepts as true for purposes of the motions to dismiss. See N.Y. Pet Welfare Ass’n v. City of New York, 850 F.3d 79, 86 (2d Cir. 2017). Plaintiffs are successive owners of the Property. On March 16, 2004, Narul Tony Hack, a resident of Bayside, Queens, acquired title to the Property: Queens County Tax Block 4541 Lot 10. (Am. Compl.

27, 42-43.) In November 2004, Hack began to construct a building on the Property, but he ceased construction in June 2005. (Id.