CHICOPEE HOUSING AUTHORITY v. MICHAEL S. BOUTIN (And a Consolidated Case).

• Court: Massachusetts Appeals Court
• Decided: April 25, 2024
• Docket: 23-P-0162
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOTICE: Summary decisions issued by the Appeals Court pursuant to M.A.C. Rule 23.0, as appearing in 97 Mass. App. Ct. 1017 (2020) (formerly known as rule 1:28, as amended by 73 Mass. App. Ct. 1001 [2009]), are primarily directed to the parties and, therefore, may not fully address the facts of the case or the panel's decisional rationale. Moreover, such decisions are not circulated to the entire court and, therefore, represent only the views of the panel that decided the case. A summary decision pursuant to rule 23.0 or rule 1:28 issued after February 25, 2008, may be cited for its persuasive value but, because of the limitations noted above, not as binding precedent. See Chace v. Curran, 71 Mass. App. Ct. 258, 260 n.4 (2008).

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS

APPEALS COURT

23-P-162

CHICOPEE HOUSING AUTHORITY

vs.

MICHAEL S. BOUTIN (and a consolidated case1).

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 23.0

The Chicopee Housing Authority (landlord) filed a summary

process action seeking to evict the defendant (tenant) for

alleged violations of the terms of his lease. After a bench

trial, a Housing Court judge found that the landlord met its

burden of proving that the tenant substantially breached his

lease by interfering with another resident's right to quiet

enjoyment of his home. The judge twice deferred entry of

judgment, however, to allow the tenant to preserve his tenancy

by accepting a transfer to another unit. When the tenant

refused to accept the transfer, judgment for possession entered

for the landlord.

1 The consolidated case involves the same parties. The judge then held a second bench trial on the tenant's

counterclaims for interference with quiet enjoyment and breach

of the implied warranty of habitability, which had been severed

from the summary process action. See Spence v. O'Brien, 15

Mass. App. Ct. 489, 499 (1983) (G. L. c. 239, § 8A, which

authorizes conditions-based counterclaims or defenses in summary

process actions, does not apply where landlord's claim for

possession is premised on tenant's fault). The judge found that

the evidence adduced at trial did not support any of the

tenant's counterclaims, and judgment for the landlord entered

accordingly.

The tenant filed timely notices of appeal from both

judgments. The appeals were consolidated in this court and are

now before us.

The tenant's briefs, which we have reviewed carefully, do

not contain a concise statement of the issues, a statement of

the applicable standard of review, or any citation to the record

or legal authority, as required by the rules of appellate

procedure. See Mass. R.A.P. 16 (a), as appearing in 481 Mass.

1628 (2019). While we acknowledge and accept the tenant's

representation that he did his best, "[t]he fact that the

[tenant] represents himself does not excuse his noncompliance

with procedural rules." Brossard v. West Roxbury Div. of the

Dist. Court Dep't, 417 Mass. 183, 184 (1994). Even with

2 considerable leniency, we cannot discern from the tenant's

briefs precisely what issues he is raising on appeal and are

thus unable to engage in meaningful appellate review.

Nonetheless, given the tenant's pro se status, we have

independently reviewed the judge's decisions and, after doing

so, see no basis on which to disturb either of them. On review

of a judgment after a bench trial, "we accept [the judge's]

findings of fact as true unless they are clearly erroneous, and

we give due regard to the judge's assessment of the witnesses'

credibility." Andover Hous. Auth. v. Shkolnik, 443 Mass. 300,

306 (2005). Both of the judge's decisions here were based on

his weighing of the evidence and his assessment of witness

credibility, to which we must defer. See Saipe v. Sullivan &

Co., Inc., 487 Mass. 1001, 1004 (2021). None of the judge's

findings have been shown to be clearly erroneous.

We have also considered the tenant's allegations, all

unsupported by citation to the record, that the judge was

biased. To the extent the tenant's claim is based on the

judge's rulings, adverse rulings alone are insufficient to

establish judicial bias except "'in the rarest circumstances'

where they 'reveal such a high degree of favoritism or

antagonism as to make fair judgment impossible,'" which is far

from the case here. Passero v. Fitzsimmons, 92 Mass. App. Ct.

76, 83 (2017), quoting Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 540,

3 555 (1994). To the extent the tenant is claiming bias arising

from an extrajudicial source, there is no evidence in the record

to support such a claim.

In sum, the tenant has failed to show that he is entitled

to relief from either of the judgments, which are therefore

affirmed.

Judgment dated December 6, 2021, affirmed.

Judgment dated June 16, 2022, affirmed.

By the Court (Vuono, Shin & Toone, JJ.2),

Assistant Clerk

Entered: April 25, 2024.

2 The panelists are listed in order of seniority.