Hello,

I recently filed a small claims complaint on two tenants in one apartment that owed for several months rent and were evicted.

The complaint was written as two individual defendants because on the lease it said " If there are multiple Tenants signed to this Lease, all

such Tenants are jointly, severally and individually bound by, and liable under, the terms and conditions of this Lease. A judgment entered against one Tenant shall be no bar to an action against other Tenants"

One of the tenants was just served the SC complaint but the second tenant I haven't been able to locate and I believe he moved out of state.

My question is will the court allow the case to move forward against just one of the defendants or will it delay the process since the second defendant has not been notified of the complaint ?

Not sure what happens in that type of situation.

Thanks,

A lot of what you ask is dependent on your state law of civil procedure.

But in general,

The second defendant who has not been served obviously cannot be judged, since he has not been served.

I would guess that the first defendant who HAS been served can be judged and a judgement entered against him, probably as part of the joint suit. If not, you should be able to drop the second defendant and to proceed against the first defendant. Whether you can do that at time of the hearing, I don't know.