Eviction Withdrawn On Technicality

A landlord of a West River home at the center of a child lead poisoning debate formally ended his attempts to evict his groundfloor tenants after the tenants’ lawyer discovered a legal technicality that tripped up the case.

On Wednesday Abdullah Soliman, a 35-year-old software engineer from New York City who owns the two-family house at 75 Sherman Ave., formally withdrew the Notice to Quit that he had given to tenants Maajid Muhammad and Raihana Akhdar, who live in the ground-floor three-bedroom apartment with their four young children.

Soliman had initially issued the eviction notice in February because of Muhammad’s nonpayment of rent. In Superior Court Judge Anthony Avallone’s housing court on the third floor of the Elm Street courthouse two Thursdays ago, Muhammad countered Soliman’s eviction notice with claims that the landlord and the city failed to protect his 1‑year-old child, Malik, from dangerous exposure to lead in the apartment. Malik tested for an elevated blood lead level of 11 micrograms per deciliter (mg/dL) in November 2017. His blood lead level was still at 11 mg/dL after a subsequent blood test in May.

Last week, both plaintiff and tenant lawyered up. Soliman hired Ori Spiegel of New Haven’s Lawrence Levinson Law Office; Amy Marx of the New Haven Legal Assistance Association took on the representation of Muhammad and Akhdar. Earlier this week, the Independent reported that a second child in the upstairs apartment at 75 Sherman Ave. had also tested with elevated blood lead levels of 6 and 7 mg/dL in the past five months.

On Wednesday, as both sides prepared to appear before Avallone’s court to argue over the habitability of Muhammad and Akhdar’s apartment, Marx filed a motion to dismiss on behalf of Akhdar claiming that Soliman had failed to properly issue the initial eviction notice.

Marx wrote to the court that Akhdar received an eviction notice on Feb. 22 for nonpayment of rent. Later that same night, Marx noted, Soliman sent a text message to Muhammad, letting him know about the notice to quit and telling him that he would withdraw the eviction if they paid their February rent within three days.

“Such offer of a three day period in which to pay off the rent,” Marx wrote, ​“after the service of the Notice to Quit, served to equivocate the Notice to Quit. In order [to] serve as the valid basis for a summary process eviction, the Notice to Quit must be an unequivocal act on the part of the Plaintiff to terminate the lease.”

Therefore, Marx argued, Soliman’s initial eviction notice ​“is a defect that deprives the Court of subject matter jurisdiction and requires dismissal of this action.”

Later on Wednesday, Soliman formerly withdrew the action from court, and Judge Avallone confirmed the withdrawal, thereby dismissing the case.

Akdhar, whose family has been living at the New Haven Village Suites in Long Wharf at Soliman’s expense for the last two weeks as Soliman hires a contractor to implement a lead abatement plan for their Sherman Avenue apartment, said she was relieved that the eviction had been withdrawn.

“I’m so happy that it has been taken off of us,” she said about the eviction. ​“I want an apology from [Soliman] because of everything he put us through.”

Akdhar said that she has not heard from Soliman in the day since the court case was dismissed. She said that she and Marx plan to meet tomorrow to discuss her family’s next steps regarding when they can move back into their apartment.

Soliman did not respond to phone and email messages requesting for comment by the publication time of this article. Earlier in the week, he said he had finalized an agreement with a lead abatement contractor and that that contractor should begin work at the Sherman Avenue home later this week.

Toxic Soil

On May 3 the city’s Health Department also sent Soliman a follow-up letter on its initial lead inspection of Muhammad and Akdhar’s apartment, noting that the soil in the building’s front yard has lead levels four times higher than what the state deems contaminated in residential areas.

The letter says that inspector Glenda Buenaventura’s April 10 inspection of the property revealed that the soil in the front yard contains 1790 parts per million (ppm) of lead. The state deems soil containing more than 400 ppm of lead as contaminated in residential areas. The letter also notes that a follow up soil test was conducted on April 30, but that the results from that subsequent test are not yet available.

“The Director of Health has determined the presence of such lead contaminated soil constitutes a potential health hazard to resident children,” the letter reads.

The letter calls on Soliman to initiate abatement of the toxic levels of lead within 45 working days of receipt of the letter. The letter says that Soliman must have the lead soil abatement methods approved by the Health Department before he begins the work.

Previous coverage:

• 2nd Child Poisoned; Where’s The City?
• Carpenter With Poisoned Kid Tries A Fix
• High Lead Levels Stall Eviction
• 460 Kids Poisoned By Lead In 2 Years
• Bid-Rigging Claimed In Lead Cleanup
• Judge Orders Total Lead Paint Clean-Up
• Legal Aid Takes City To Task On Lead