Unlike other housing courts, Chicago’s building court is characterized by leniency. The mostly low-income property owners who appear in building court often receive extensions to remedy building code violations or even dismissals of their violations. This article shows that, paradoxically, the consequences of these lenient outcomes are punitive for building court defendants, replicating the kinds of detrimental outcomes that harsher legal enforcement can produce. Building on conceptual apparatus from socio-legal studies, I identify two mechanisms—property markers and hassle of leniency—through which building court entrenches or even exacerbates housing precarity for low-income homeowners and small-time landlords. I argue that without additional support for low-income defendants, even well-intentioned leniency on the part of municipal officials and legal actors reinforces economic inequities in the housing market.

中文翻译：

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财产标记和宽大处理的麻烦：法庭上建筑规范的执行

与其他住房法庭不同，芝加哥的建筑法庭的特点是宽大。出现在建筑法庭的大多数是低收入业主，通常会获得延期，以纠正违反建筑法规的行为，甚至驳回其违法行为。本文表明，矛盾的是，这些宽大的结果对于建立法庭被告来说是惩罚性的，复制了更严厉的法律执行可能产生的有害结果。基于社会法律研究的概念工具，我确定了两种机制——财产标记和宽大处理的麻烦——通过这两种机制，建立法院会巩固甚至加剧低收入房主和小房东的住房不稳定。我认为，如果不为低收入被告提供额外支持，