Opinion

Espino v. New York City Board of Education

  • 80 A.D.3d 496
  • 915 N.Y.S.2d 66
Court
Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
Filed
Jan 18, 2011
Status
Published
Cited by
9 cases
Authority
More cited than 78.7%

The opinion

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Larry S. Schachner, J.), entered on or about May 1, 2009, which, insofar as appealed from as limited by the briefs, denied the motion of defendant Board of Education for summary judgment dismissing the complaint as against it, unanimously reversed, on the law, without costs, and the motion granted. The Clerk is directed to enter judgment in favor of defendant dismissing the complaint.

Defendant Board established its prima facie entitlement to judgment as a matter of law in this action where infant plaintiff, a 17-year-old student, was injured during a fight in a school hallway. The evidence demonstrates that the supervision provided for students of plaintiffs age was sufficient (see Barretto v City of New York, 229 AD2d 214, 219 [1997], lv denied 90 NY2d 805 [1997]), that the attack on plaintiff was sudden and spontaneous and could not have been prevented by more supervision (see Mirand v City of New York, 84 NY2d 44, 49 [1994]; McCollin v Roman Catholic Archdiocese of N.Y., 45 AD3d 478, 479 [2007]), and that defendant had no prior notice of the problems between plaintiff and his assailants (see Brandy B. v Eden Cent. School Dist., 15 NY3d 297, 302 [2010]; Mirand at 49 ).

*497 Plaintiffs’ opposition failed to raise a triable issue of fact. It cannot be said that there is an issue with respect to whether defendant violated its duty of supervision, since in the absence of any notice of a specific threat to infant plaintiff, it is reasonable to leave high school students unsupervised for several minutes (see Johnsen v Carmel Cent. School Dist., 277 AD2d 354 [2000]), especially where, as here, there were adults in the immediate vicinity. Nor is there a triable issue regarding whether the school’s safety plan, which required that a person be stationed in the area where the fight occurred, was violated. That plan required personnel to patrol the halls, with the top priority being to keep the halls clear and move the students along, and a witness testified that she saw this happening. Concur— Gonzalez, P.J., Mazzarelli, Moskowitz and Acosta, JJ.

This is a copy of a public record, reproduced as it was published. It is not legal advice, and it may not be the version a court would rely on. Check the official source before you cite it.

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