Summary judgment sustained for scaffold-injury plaintiff

The Appellate Division has sustained the grant of summary judgment to the plaintiff in a scaffolding case, holding that any dispute about the nature of the plaintiff's damages do not speak to liability to but to damages and will be resolved at a damages hearing.

The case is Sangare v. 985 Bruckner Boulevard, issued on January 24. I briefed and argued the appeal. The case is being litigated at the trial level by James Sullivan, Esq., of New York City. The New York scaffolding law requires property owners to provide employees protection against falling scaffolds as well as any gravity-related accidents that might result from poorly-secured scaffolds. That would include falling bricks, two-by-fours and other objects. Supreme Court, Bronx County, granted plaintiff's motion for summary judgment because there was no dispute that he was injured when wooden planks fell from a scaffold, hitting plaintiff in the head (he was wearing a hard-hat). 

In opposition to the summary judgment motion, and on appeal, defendants argued that plaintiff cannot prevail on liability because, in order to win the case, the plaintiff has to show his damages resulted from the accident. The logic was that since plaintiff's back injury might have been caused by something else, he cannot win on liability as a matter of law. The problem with that argument is that the First Department held in Gramigna v. Morse Diesel, 210 A.D.2d 115 (1st Dept., 1994), that arguments like defendant's are really for the jury and that the plaintiff can win summary judgment on liability if there is no dispute that the accident happened and something went afoul with the scaffold. The problem with Gramigna is that the case is nearly 30 years old and, since that time, the courts have not cited it for that proposition. Having a case on all-fours is all well and good, but courts sometimes view older cases differently over time and maybe the First Department will think the case was outdated. At  least that was my worry.

The First Department, however, cited Gramigna in affirming summary judgment for the plaintiff in this case. So Gramigna has been reaffirmed nearly 30 years later. Here is the First Department's reasoning: "Defendants’ argument that all or some of the injuries pled were not caused by the subject accident is not an issue of liability, but rather an issue of damages, which remains unresolved The dispute concerning damages does not raise credibility issues relative to the issue of liability where plaintiff gave no inconsistent version of how the accident occurred nor is there any evidence contradicting the allegation that the scaffold collapsed."