McKenna v. Begin

This case returns to us following its remand to the Superior Court for computation by the trial judge of the damages owed to a tenant by his landlord for breach of the implied warranty of habitability. Under that warranty principle, first fully elaborated in this Commonwealth in Boston Housing Authy. v. Hemingway, 363 Mass. 184 (1973), the judge had awarded damages to the plaintiff McKenna against his landlord, the defendant Begin, for violations of the State Sanitary Code1 in the latter’s apartment building, as certified by the Greenfield board of health.

The judge recognized that according…