Concord Madison Woburn LLC v. Kelechi Linardon.

• Court: Massachusetts Appeals Court
• Decided: December 5, 2025
• Docket: 24-P-1216
• Status: Unpublished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

24-P-1216

CONCORD MADISON WOBURN LLC

vs.

KELECHI LINARDON.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER PURSUANT TO RULE 23.0

The plaintiff filed a summary process action seeking to

regain possession of a hotel room occupied by the defendant.

After the defendant failed to appear at the first-tier court

event, a default judgment entered against her. The defendant

filed a motion to vacate the default judgment, which a Housing

Court judge denied on October 17, 2024, after the defendant

failed to appear at the hearing on the motion. The defendant

appeals from that order.1

At the outset we must address the plaintiff's motion to

dismiss the appeal as moot. The motion represents that the

1The defendant also appeals from an order dated October 11, 2024, scheduling a virtual hearing on her motion to vacate. defendant vacated the premises on December 16, 2024, and that

the plaintiff now has possession. According to the plaintiff,

this renders the appeal moot because possession was the sole

relief requested by either party below. But although the

defendant did not file a response to the plaintiff's motion, we

note that she asserted several counterclaims in which she

requested damages. As those counterclaims do not appear to have

been mooted by the defendant's vacating the premises, we will

address the merits.

We construe the defendant's brief to be arguing that the

judge erred by not granting a continuance of the hearing on her

motion to vacate the default judgment. At several points in her

brief, the defendant claims that the judge denied her request

for a continuance even though she submitted "medical

documentation" establishing the need for an accommodation. But

the defendant's brief is devoid of any citation to the record,

and there is no such medical documentation in the record

appendix. Her argument fails for this reason alone. See Mass.

R. A. P. 16 (a) (9), as appearing in 481 Mass. 1628 (2019);

Mass. R. A. P. 18 (a) (1), as appearing in 481 Mass. 1637

(2019).

Furthermore, based on the record materials that the

defendant has submitted to us, it appears that she requested an

accommodation in the form of "a 2:00 pm virtual hearing" and

2 that the judge allowed that request in an order dated October

11, 2024, stating that he would "conduct the motion hearing on

10/17/24 at 2:00 pm virtually as a courtesy accommodation to the

unsupported request." The judge further stated that "[a]ny

further accommodation may only be made by submitting a letter

from a healthcare provider, on letterhead, under oath,

explaining the diagnosis and nexus to the accommodation." This

suggests that, contrary to the defendant's unsupported

assertions on appeal, she did not submit medical documentation

to the judge in support of her request for an accommodation. In

short, we discern no abuse of discretion in the judge's decision

not to continue the hearing, to the extent the defendant

requested that relief. See Botsaris v. Botsaris, 26 Mass. App.

Ct. 254, 256 (1988) (whether to grant continuance is in

discretion of judge).

The remaining issues raised by the defendant, as we

understand them, are not relevant to whether the judge erred in

declining to vacate the default judgment. These include the

defendant's arguments that the judge should have allowed her

motion for a change of venue and her motion to dismiss the

complaint because the plaintiff is an improper party. To the

extent we have not specifically addressed any of the defendant's

arguments, we see nothing in them that warrants relief.

3 In its motion to dismiss, the plaintiff has requested that

we "order that no court of this Commonwealth accept any further

filing from [the defendant] concerning this dispute" without

preauthorization. That request is denied, as the plaintiff has

cited no case supporting the proposition that a panel of this

court would have authority to award such relief.

October 11, 2024 order scheduling virtual motion hearing affirmed.

October 17, 2024 order denying motion to vacate default judgment affirmed.

By the Court (Desmond, Shin & Walsh, JJ.2),

Clerk

Entered: December 5, 2025.

2 The panelists are listed in order of seniority.