O'Jon v. Consolidated Edison Co. of New York

2017 NY Slip Op 1292, 147 A.D.3d 570, 46 N.Y.S.3d 787

Opinion

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Wilma Guzman, J.), entered October 8, 2015, which denied the motion of defendant Vales Construction Corp. (Vales) for summary judgment dismissing the complaint and all cross claims as against it, unanimously reversed, on the law, without costs, and the motion granted. The Clerk is directed to enter judgment accordingly.

Vales established its entitlement to judgment as a matter of law through the testimony of its corporate secretary that Vales performed no work on the sidewalk in front of the premises where plaintiff claimed she tripped and fell. The corporate secretary denied having found a permit issued to Vales for that location in his search of records, and explained that the issuance of a permit did not necessarily mean that work had been performed at the location.

In opposition, neither plaintiff nor defendant Brown, who was the owner of the building in front of which plaintiff fell, raised a triable issue of fact. They relied on a work order issued to Con Edison several years before the accident, which was not linked to Vales, and failed to submit any other evidence rebutting Vales’s prima facie showing (see Bermudez v City of New York, 21 AD3d 258 [1st Dept 2005]; see also Zhilkina v City of New York, 121 AD3d 975 [2d Dept 2014]). Furthermore, Brown testified that no sidewalk repair work had been performed at the accident location before plaintiff’s accident occurred.

Concur — Richter, J.P., Manzanet-Daniels, Gische, Webber and Kahn, JJ.