Cordts v. State

• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division
• Writing for the Court: MAIN
• Citation: Cordts v. State, 509 N.Y.S.2d 166, 125 A.D.2d 746 (N.Y. App. Div. 1986)
• Decision Date: 04 December 1986
• Parties: Judith CORDTS, Individually and as Administratrix of the Estate of William Cordts, Deceased, Respondent, v. STATE of New York, Appellant.

Page 166

509 N.Y.S.2d 166

125 A.D.2d 746

Judith CORDTS, Individually and as Administratrix of the Estate of William Cordts, Deceased, Respondent, v. STATE of New York, Appellant.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division Third Department.

Dec. 4, 1986.

Robert Abrams, Atty. Gen. (Calvin M. Berger, of counsel), Albany, for appellant.

Paul F. McAloon and David H. Pentkowski, c/o Grogan, Steenburg & Pentkowski, Clifton Park, and Raskin & Rappoport, P.C., New York City, for respondent.

Before MAHONEY, P.J., and MAIN, MIKOLL, YESAWICH and HARVEY, JJ.

MAIN, Justice.

Appeal from a judgment in favor of claimant, entered November 7, 1985, upon a decision of the Court of Claims (Benza, J.).

At about 6:30 A.M. on November 27, 1981, decedent, William Cordts, was driving his automobile in a generally westerly direction on State Highway Route 55 in the Town of Wawarsing, Ulster County. A mixture of sleet and rain was falling and the pavement was wet but unfrozen. As he crossed the Honk Lake bridge, the surface of which was ice covered, his vehicle went into a spin. The vehicle, still spinning, continued down the highway for some distance until it crossed over to the south side of the highway where, according to the State's accident reconstruction expert, the rear end of the vehicle came in contact with a guiderail and the support posts of a traffic sign which were implanted immediately adjacent to the guiderail wires. At impact, the car spun in the opposite direction and, when the side of the car struck the guiderail, the vehicle rolled over the guiderail and down an embankment where it finally came to rest. Shortly thereafter, decedent was found face downward under the car's rear axle. He never regained consciousness and died at the scene. There were no eyewitnesses to the accident and much of the evidence concerning its happening came from accident reconstruction experts.

Claimant commenced this action alleging that the State was negligent in allowing the guiderails along the highway to remain in a state of disrepair through lack of maintenance, thus becoming defective, and in permitting the highway to remain ice covered for an extended period of time. Claimant further contended that the State knew or should have known of the dangerous condition and failed to correct it or warn the traveling public of the condition. After a trial, the Court of Claims, apparently crediting the testimony of the State's reconstruction expert, determined that the proximate cause of the accident was not the deteriorated condition of the guiderails, but rather was the positioning of the support posts for the traffic sign at a place so close to the guiderail as to prevent it from performing its intended function of deflecting a vehicle, thereby preventing the vehicle from leaving the highway. It was the court's conclusion that the force of the contact of the vehicle with the sign support posts caused the vehicle to pivot in the opposite direction and roll over the guiderail and down the embankment. The only evidence as to the speed of the vehicle indicated it to be well within the permissible limit, and the court found decedent free of any negligence. At the time of his death, decedent was 29 years old and left surviving his wife, age 28, three sons ages eight, seven and three and a daughter one month old. The Court of Claims awarded claimant the sum of $1,217,206.07 in damages.

On appeal, the State maintains that it may not be held liable since the sign supports were erected by the State in conformity with contemporaneous design standards and were not known by the State to constitute a danger to users of the highway. Further, the State contends that the damages should have been mitigated because of decedent's failure to use an available and operable seat belt.

We consider first the State's assertion that, since the placement of the sign posts was a planning decision, no liability may attach. It is long and well established that while certainly not an insurer of the safety of travelers on its roadways, the State owes to the traveling public the nondelegable duty of keeping its highways in a reasonably safe condition (Friedman v. State of New York, 67 N.Y.2d 271, 283, 502 N.Y.S.2d 669, 493 N.E.2d 893). While governmental liability for highway injuries is somewhat limited by Weiss v. Fote, 7 N.Y.2d 579, 200 N.Y.S.2d 409, 167 N.E.2d 63, that case provides that liability for injury arising out of the operation of a duly executed highway safety plan may only be predicated on proof that the plan either was evolved without adequate study or lacked reasonable basis (id., at 589, 200 N.Y.S.2d 409, 167 N.E.2d 63). It is this limitation upon which the State relies and mistakenly so, we conclude.

The only testimony as to the location of the sign supports was to the effect that their placement was in accordance with the State standards existing in the 1970s. The substance of those standards was not revealed. Such a bald assertion provides no magic cloak of immunity (cf. Cordero v. City of New York, 112 A.D.2d 914, 915, 492 N.Y.S.2d 430). Moreover, the placement of the sign supports had no reasonable basis. It is obvious, even without expert assistance, that the placement of the supports effectively thwarted the function of the guiderails, i.e., to deflect a vehicle coming in contact with them back upon the roadway. Hence, it appears from the...