DeJesus v. New York City Housing Authority

53 A.D.3d 410, 861 N.Y.S.2d 31
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedJuly 8, 2008
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 53 A.D.3d 410 (DeJesus v. New York City Housing Authority) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
DeJesus v. New York City Housing Authority, 53 A.D.3d 410, 861 N.Y.S.2d 31 (N.Y. Ct. App. 2008).

Opinion

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (John A. Barone, J.), entered July 17, 2007, which denied defendant’s motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, reversed, on the law, without costs, the motion granted and the complaint dismissed. The Clerk is directed to enter judgment accordingly.

Shortly after 8:00 a.m. on December 19, 2004, as she returned from leaving a bag of recyclable trash next to a fence surrounding a locked outdoor “dump site” in the Marble Hill Houses in the Bronx, plaintiff, a home health aide who had been working for one of the tenants for the past year and a half, slipped and fell on a small one-foot triangular piece of yellow carpet that was “wet on the bottom” and was laying in the walkway to the dump site. Prior to her fall, plaintiff had not seen the piece of carpet on the walkway, either on her trip to or from the site.

In denying defendant’s motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, the court found a question of fact as to whether it knew of, caused or created the condition that caused plaintiff’s accident. However, defendant’s caretaker testi-[411]*411fled that twice a day, at 9:30 a.m. and approximately 2:00 p.m., he would clean up any garbage improperly left by tenants along the fence near the fenced-in and locked dump site, where there was a “No Dumping” sign posted. Given this undisputed testimony, plaintiffs testimony that she observed approximately 10 bags of garbage along the fence on the day of her accident and always saw garbage in the same area whenever she went to the site twice weekly to discard her employer’s recyclable trash was insufficient to raise a triable issue of fact as to whether defendant knew or should have known of the piece of carpet on which she slipped.

It is well settled that neither a general awareness of the presence of litter or some other dangerous condition nor plaintiffs observation of trash in the general area is legally sufficient to charge defendant with constructive notice of the piece of carpet she slipped on (see Gordon v American Museum of Natural History, 67 NY2d 836, 838 [1986]). Here, as in Gordon, the defect in plaintiff’s case is not an inability to prove the element of causation, but the “lack of evidence establishing constructive notice of the particular condition that caused [her] fall” (id.). This is not a case where it can be said that despite its conceded knowledge that garbage was being left in the area next to the dump site, defendant negligently failed to take any measures to avoid the creation of a dangerous condition. In fact, the caretaker testified that after he told his supervisor of the ongoing problem of improper dumping, he was directed to—and did— regularly remove any improperly discarded garbage and clean the area. On the evidence presented, the piece of carpet that caused plaintiffs fall, which was about 10 feet away from where plaintiff left her garbage, “could have been deposited there only minutes or seconds before the accident and any other conclusion would be pure speculation” (id.; see also Rivera v 2160 Realty Co., L.L.C., 4 NY3d 837 [2005]). Concur—Andrias, Williams and Buckley, JJ.

Mazzarelli, J.P., and Acosta, J., dissent in a memorandum by Acosta, J., as follows: Because in my view there are clear, triable issues of fact as to “an ongoing and recurring dangerous condition existing] in the area of the accident which was routinely left unaddressed by the landlord” (O’Connor-Miele v Barhite & Holzinger, 234 AD2d 106-107 [1996]), I respectfully dissent and would affirm the motion court.

Defendant was clearly aware of the dangerous conditions caused by the continuous and repeated acts of leaving garbage in an area that was neither designed nor designated for garbage drop-off. The majority’s reliance on Gordon v American Museum [412]*412of Natural History (67 NY2d 836 [1986]) is misplaced inasmuch as defendant’s knowledge goes beyond a “general awareness” that garbage might be left in the area, and creates an issue of fact as to whether defendant caused or created the condition. Although defendant argues it did not cause or create the condition because tenants were never permitted to bring garbage to this area and it directed them to place garbage elsewhere, the record as to these facts is unclear. At one point during his deposition, the caretaker stated that tenants were not permitted to do so; at another he stated that for a period of time they were. Furthermore, while defendant claims that it sent fliers to the tenants advising them not to leave their garbage in the area, these fliers were not part of the record. Worse, the caretaker testified that such fliers may have gone out once every five years, with the last distribution possibly occurring in 2002, no less than six months prior to plaintiff commencing employment for the tenant at defendant’s premises.

The condition was also not transient, but one that occurred in a variety of shapes and forms every day (compare Rivera v 2160 Realty Co., L.L.C., 4 NY3d 837 [2005] [which reinstated the grant of summary judgment for a defendant where a dangerous condition—garbage strewn on steps—did not recur on a daily basis, the Court noting the absence of garbage on the steps the night before the accident]). Defendant’s caretaker corroborated plaintiff’s testimony of the dangerous condition, having complained to his supervisor and being instructed to “make sure you clean it up.”

Indeed, the facts that there was a sign in the area that said “No Dumping,” and that defendant purports to have sent notices to all tenants once every five years directing them not to leave garbage in the area, suggest that defendant was aware of tenants leaving garbage in the “dumping site” but did not take sufficient steps to remedy the recurrent dangerous condition. This is an obvious issue of fact that prevents summary dismissal of plaintiffs action.

Furthermore, the majority’s apparent reliance on Rivera and Gordon for the proposition that the defect in plaintiffs case is her failure to prove defendant’s constructive notice of the “particular condition that caused [her] fall” (namely, the piece of carpet) simply misses the point. First, unlike the present case, the defective condition in Rivera was not a daily event. Indeed, as the Court there noted, the condition did not exist the night before the accident. Moreover, even after Rivera was decided, this Court has permitted claims of negligence based on recurrent conditions, as long as sufficient evidence has been submit[413]*413ted to raise a triable issue of fact. For example, in Irizarry v 15 Mosholu Four, LLC (24 AD3d 373 [2005]), this Court found the plaintiff to have tendered evidence, in the form of her deposition testimony and that of a nonparty witness, that refuse on the subject stairwell was a recurring condition that frequently remained unremedied. The Irizarry plaintiff proffered testimony from other tenants who also described the ongoing condition of how garbage would accumulate on the stairs after tenants brought their bags downstairs for disposal. This sufficiently indicated “not only that refuse on the subject stairwell was a recurring condition, but that it frequently remained unrem-edied” (id. at 374).

Bido v 876-882 Realty, LLC (41 AD3d 311 [2007]), where the plaintiff slipped and fell on debris in the stairwell of the defendant’s building, is also instructive.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
53 A.D.3d 410, 861 N.Y.S.2d 31, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dejesus-v-new-york-city-housing-authority-nyappdiv-2008.