Figueroa v. Goetz
| Decision Date | 09 March 2004 |
| Docket Number | 2275. |
| Citation | 2004 NY Slip Op 01495,774 N.Y.S.2d 9,5 A.D.3d 164 |
| Parties | FRANCISCO FIGUEROA et al., Respondents, v. DEBRA GOETZ et al., Respondents, and ROBERTA R. GOODMAN, Appellant, et al., Defendant. |
| Court | New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division |
Plaintiff, a building superintendent at a cooperative apartment building located at 252 West 85th Street in Manhattan, was injured when a 36-inch-by-36-inch piece of plaster/sheetrock ceiling fell on him as he bent over in the waiting room of a professional apartment, number 1B, to pick up a bucket, filled with water, that had earlier been placed, empty, under a leak in the ceiling. Plaintiff testified that before he returned to apartment 1B to remove the bucket, he had found water running from an overflowing bathtub in apartment 2B and observed the entire apartment covered with an inch of water. On these facts, defendant Goodman, the owner of apartment 1B, which she had occupied for the past 12 years before the accident, moved for summary judgment, arguing that she had no prior notice of ceiling cracks or, indeed, of any water stains in the subject ceiling and that the cause of the sudden unexpected collapse of her ceiling was due to the cascading water emanating from apartment 2B. Supreme Court denied defendant Goodman's motion, finding that given Goodman's acknowledgment of a prior leak in the same ceiling some years before, which had been repaired, she believed, by the building owner's contractors, she had failed to prove that she lacked notice of any ceiling defect and that neither she nor the workers she had hired to repair the ceiling after the previous leak did not contribute to the ceiling collapse. In so ruling, Supreme Court completely skewed the burden of proof applicable to summary judgment (see Strowman v Great Atl. & Pac. Tea Co., 252 AD2d 384 [1998]). Accordingly, we reverse and dismiss the complaint against defendant Goodman.
In the case of a ceiling collapse, it is the plaintiff's burden to show actual or constructive notice of a defect...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Toussaint v. Ocean Ave. Apartment Assocs., LLC
...of the leak and that the leak was never repaired’ ” (Ellisy v. Eklecco, LLC, 56 A.D.3d 517, 868 N.Y.S.2d 82, quoting Figueroa v. Goetz, 5 A.D.3d 164, 165, 774 N.Y.S.2d 9 ). A defendant has constructive notice of a defect when the defect is visible and apparent, and existed for a sufficient ......
-
Clemente v. 205 W. 103 Owners Corp.
...the defendant had prior notice, actual or constructive, of the leak and that the leak was never repaired." Figueroa v. Goetz, 5 A.D.3d 164, 165, 774 N.Y.S.2d 9, 10 (1st Dep't 2004). The record is devoid of any such evidence, there being no evidentiary basis to support the expert's assumptio......
-
Best v. 1482 Montgomery Estates, LLC
...a crack and leaked water ( see Govan v. Ft. Sheri Realty Co., 267 A.D.2d 99, 700 N.Y.S.2d 3 [1st Dept.1999];cf. Figueroa v. Goetz, 5 A.D.3d 164, 774 N.Y.S.2d 9 [1st Dept.2004] ). That the building manager's employee denied receiving any such complaints, only created credibility questions fo......
-
Dunson v. Riverbay Corp.
...Thus, there exist triable issues of fact whether defendant had actual notice of the defective condition ( see Figueroa v. Goetz, 5 A.D.3d 164, 165, 774 N.Y.S.2d 9 [1st Dept. 2004] ). While defendant's records contain a February 2007 work order that confirms that plaintiff complained, at lea......