Pendleton v. City of New York

• Decision Date: 09 October 2007
• Docket Number: 2006-04748.,10694/94.
• Citation: 2007 NY Slip Op 07677,44 A.D.3d 733,843 N.Y.S.2d 648
• Parties: KEVIN PENDLETON, Appellant, v. CITY OF NEW YORK et al., Respondents.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

44 A.D.3d 733

843 N.Y.S.2d 648

2007 NY Slip Op 07677

KEVIN PENDLETON, Appellant, v. CITY OF NEW YORK et al., Respondents.

2006-04748.

10694/94.

Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Second Department.

Decided October 9, 2007.

In an action, inter alia, to recover damages for false arrest and malicious prosecution, the plaintiff appeals, as limited by

his brief, from so much of an order of the Supreme Court, Kings County (Hinds-Radix, J.), dated March 24, 2006, as granted those branches of the defendants' cross motion which were pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) to dismiss, as time-barred, the fifth cause of action of the amended complaint insofar as asserted against the defendants City of New York and New York City Police Department and so much of the fifth cause of action as was predicated upon claims of false arrest and false imprisonment insofar as asserted against the defendant Joseph Falcone. [See 11 Misc 3d 1080(A), 2006 NY Slip Op 50632(U).]

Ordered that the order is reversed insofar as appealed from, on the law, with costs, and those branches of the defendants' cross motion which were pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) to dismiss, as time-barred, the fifth cause of action of the amended complaint insofar as asserted against the defendants City of New York and New York City Police Department and so much of the fifth cause of action as was predicated on claims of false arrest and false imprisonment insofar as asserted against the defendant Joseph Falcone are denied.

The plaintiff was arrested in 1991 on a charge of second degree murder and related charges. He was incarcerated for approximately 13 months before being released on his own recognizance on September 8, 1992. On November 13, 1992, the charges against him were dismissed. In February 1993 he served a notice of claim upon the City of New York, naming, as respondents, the City, the New York City Police Department (hereinafter the municipal defendants) and the arresting officer, Detective Joseph Falcone. The plaintiff then commenced this action asserting causes of action sounding in false arrest and imprisonment, malicious prosecution, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligent hiring and training. The original complaint set forth the circumstances surrounding his arrest and incarceration and alleged, inter alia, that the municipal defendants had breached their duty "to train, discipline, supervise, promulgate and put into effect appropriate rules applicable to the duties, activities and behaviors of its police officers, detectives, servants, agents, employees and/or personnel."

In 2004 the Supreme Court granted the plaintiff's motion for leave to amend the complaint to set forth violations of the federal and state constitutions and the federal Civil Rights Act (42 USC § 1983). The fifth cause of action of the amended complaint alleged that the plaintiff's constitutional rights were violated as a result of policies or customs of the municipal defendants concerning the hiring, training, supervision, retention, and discipline of members of the police department, and those involving the arrest, detention, and prosecution of individuals, especially those of African-American descent. It alleged that the municipal defendants had policies or customs of: "encouraging, approving and/or tolerating the use by the NYPD of excessive force and acts of misconduct against civilians, and especially those civilians who are of African American descent, and subsequent attempts to conceal such actions by failing to adequately train, supervise, and discipline its agents, employees and offices." The fifth cause of action also alleged that the municipal defendants were "deliberately indifferent to the use of improper procedures in the detention and arrest of civilians, and especially those civilians who are of African American descent, and established a custom policy and/or practice of encouraging, approving and/or tolerating the use of said improper procedures by the NYPD and subsequent attempts to conceal such actions by failing to adequately train, supervise, and discipline its agents, employees and offices." Further, it alleged that the municipal defendants failed to properly or effectively train its employees with regard to proper constitutional and statutory limits on the exercise of their authority.

The defendants cross-moved, inter alia, to dismiss the fifth cause of action pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) as time-barred, arguing that the plaintiff could not benefit from the relation-back doctrine of CPLR 203 (f) since the original complaint did not give notice of the transactions or occurrences underlying the Civil Rights Act cause of action. The defendants further sought to dismiss the first cause of action alleging state-law causes of action to recover damages for false arrest and imprisonment for a failure to serve a timely notice of claim (see General Municipal Law § 50-e [1] [a]).

The plaintiff conceded the untimeliness of his notice of claim as applied to his first cause of action alleging false arrest and imprisonment, and the Supreme Court granted that branch of the defendant's cross motion which was to dismiss that cause of action. The Supreme Court further granted that branch of the defendant's cross motion which was to dismiss, as time-barred, the fifth cause of action insofar as asserted against the municipal defendants. The Supreme Court held that the original complaint did not give sufficient notice of the policies or customs of those defendants to be proven in a cause of action pursuant to 42 USC § 1983 such that the fifth cause of action related back to the allegations of the original complaint. As to the fifth cause of action insofar as asserted against Detective Falcone, the Supreme Court determined that it did relate back to the allegations of the original complaint, but only to the extent that such cause of action was predicated on allegations of malicious prosecution, since the first cause of action alleging false arrest and imprisonment had been dismissed. The plaintiff appeals and we reverse.

CPLR 203 (f) states: "A claim asserted in an amended pleading is deemed to have been interposed at the time the claims in the original pleading were interposed, unless the original pleading does not give notice of the transactions, occurrences, or series of transactions or occurrences, to be proved pursuant to the amended pleading." This principle, termed the "relation-back doctrine," permits a plaintiff to interpose a claim or cause of action which would ordinarily be time-barred, where the allegations of the original complaint gave notice of the transactions or occurrences to be proven and the cause of action would have been timely interposed if asserted in the original complaint (see 39 Coll. Point Corp. v Transpac Capital Corp., 27 AD3d 454 [2006]; Bank of N.Y. v Midland Ave. Dev....