On January 16, 2024, Justice Ruchelsman of the Kings County Commercial Division issued a decision in Porges v. Kleinman, 2024 NY Slip Op. 30248(U), holding that a confession of judgment was unenforceable because of a failure to identify the signor’s residence, explaining:
CPLR § 3218(a)(1) provides that the ·confession of judgement must state the county where the confessor resides. The confession of judgement executed by Mr. Porges in this case states that “I reside at the address set forth both in the caption and below”. However, the caption does not contain an address at all. Rather the caption merely stated the “County of New York” which was then crossed out and changed to say “Kings”. Further, below the caption, the affidavit contains an abbreviated scilicet that reads ”State of New York County of New York”.
Thus, even if the plaintiff meant to express that he lived in the County stated above and below, the county stated above, twice mentions New York County. The signature portion of the affidavit merely states that it was executed in Kings County on January 15, 2021. Thus, the affidavit does not contain the plaintiff’s address at all and even the counties noted are different. Thus, CPLR § 3218(b) provides that a confession of judgement may be filed, but only with the clerk of the county where the defendant’s affidavit stated that the defendant resided when it as executed or where the defendant resided at the time of filing. Although in this case the plaintiff, and not defendant signed a confession of judgment the change in posture does impact the scope of the statute. Thus, the confession of judgement does not really adequately list the county where the plaintiff resides.
There is also no dispute that the confession of judgement signed by the plaintiff listed the caption as New York County and
that the defendant, through his counsel, changed the caption to Kings County. While surely there was no fraud or malicious
intent in executing this change and indeed, defendant’s counsel has submitted an affirmation that the change was made at the
direction of the clerk of the court, the change was designed to permit the clerk of Kings County to accept the confession of judgement. The defendant characterizes the change as a ministerial correction of changing the venue of enforcement from New York County to Kings County to allow the Confession to be filed in the appropriate venue. However, the confession of judgement never complied with the requirements of CPLR § 3218(a)(1) since it never clearly described the plaintiff’s county of residence. Indeed, the entire basis which permits the clerk to file the confession of judgement in Kings County is the county contained within the confession of judgement.In Fleiqel v. Blonder, 121 Misc2d 502, 468 NYS2d 95 (Supreme Court Nassau County [1983J) the court held that where a confession of judgement was changed wherein the caption was altered to reflect the correct county, and other changes as well, then the confession of judgment was insufficient to support judgement. This trivial oversight cannot simply be amended by the defendant with the intent to cure this deficiency. It is well settled that for a confession of judgement to be valid it must strictly comply with all the provisions of CPLR § 3218. Furthermore, this deficiency highlights the lack of explanation and elaboration of the confession of judgement as a whole. While there might not be legal infirmities in this regard the general nature or the haste and carelessness of the confession of judgement is apparent.
In this case, there is no dispute there has not been strict compliance with that statute. Consequently, the motion seeking to vacate the confession of judgement is granted.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).