The removal of a tenant (commercial or residential) from rental property by a law enforcement officer. In order to do so, a landlord must first file a case in landlord tenant court based upon some valid legal reason, for example, breach of the lease agreement for non-payment of rent. Once the landlord wins the lawsuit for eviction, also known as an unlawful detainer, the landlord has the right to use the city marshal to remove the tenant from the premises.
Law Dictionary – Alternative Legal Definition
Dispossession by process of law; the act of depriving a person of the possession of lands which he has held, in pursuance of the judgment of a court. Technically, the dispossession must be by judgment of law; if otherwise, it is an ouster. Eviction implies an,entry under paramount title, so as to interfere with the rights of the grantee. The object of the party making the entry is immaterial, whether it be to take all or a part of the land itself or merely an incorporeal right. Phrases equivalent in meaning are “ouster by paramount title,” “entry and disturbance,” “possession under an elder title,” and the like. Mitchell v. Warner, 5 Conn. 497. Eviction is an actual expulsion of the lessee out of all or some part of the demised premises. Pendleton v. Dyett, 4 Cow. (N. Y.) 581, 585. In a more popular sense, the term denotes turning a tenant of land out of possession, either by re entry or by legal proceedings, such as an action of ejectment. Sweet. By a loose extension, the term is sometimes applied to the ousting of a person from the possession of chattels; but, properly, it applies only to realty. In the civil law. The abandonment which one is obliged to make of a thing, in pursuance of a sentence by which he is condemned to do so. Poth. Contr. Sale, pt. 2, c. 1,