Cohen v. SYLVAN LAWRENCE COMPANY

CAYTON, Acting Judge.

This was a suit against Aaron Cohen for two months’ rent on a valet shop in a hotel. The defense was that the money had been paid to his lessor, Hotel Roosevelt, in the form of a security deposit at the time the lease was signed in 1957. At the trial it developed that the owners of the land had in February 1958; obtained a default judgment for possession against Cohen’s lessor and that the owners had later leased the premises to new operators from whom Sylvan 'Lawrence Company, the plaintiff in this case, acquired the right to operate the hotel business.

When Cohen’s term…