Rosario v. Haber

2017 NY Slip Op 554, 146 A.D.3d 685, 45 N.Y.S.3d 462, 2017 WL 366336

• Court: Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
• Decided: January 26, 2017
• Docket: 2877 302884/13
• Status: Published

Opinion

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Lucindo Suarez, J.), entered April 14, 2015, which granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

Plaintiff seeks damages for injuries she sustained when she slipped on a puddle as she descended the stairs in defendants’ building. Defendants established prima facie that they did not have constructive notice of the puddle, i.e., that they did not have an opportunity before plaintiff’s accident to discover and remedy the condition on the stairs, through plaintiff’s testimony that, two minutes before the accident, she had ascended the stairs without incident and had not noticed the puddle (see Rivera v 2160 Realty Co., L.L.C., 4 NY3d 837 [2005]; Early v Hilton Hotels Corp., 73 AD3d 559, 561 [1st Dept 2010]; Espinal v New York City Hous. Auth., 215 AD2d 281 [1st Dept 1995]).

In opposition, plaintiff submitted no evidence to show that the puddle did not come into existence during the two minutes that elapsed between her ascent and her descent on the stairs.

We have reviewed plaintiff’s remaining contentions and find them unavailing.

Concur — Acosta, J.P., Mazzarelli, Feinman and Webber, JJ.