LANDLORD’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN THIS THIRD PARTY ASSAULT CASE PROPERLY GRANTED, TENANT WAS ASSAULTED IN THE BUILDING, ASSAULT WAS NOT FORESEEABLE (SECOND DEPT).
The Second Department determined the negligence action against the landlord in this third party assault case was properly dismissed. The plaintiff tenant was assaulted in the vestibule of the building. The landlord demonstrated the attack was not foreseeable because there had been no similar assaults in the past:
The plaintiff was assaulted in the vestibule of a residential building in which she lived. The vestibule was accessed through an unlocked front door. A second door leading into the building’s lobby was locked, and there was an intercom buzzer system in the vestibule that permitted residents to control access to the building. The perpetrator of the assault was inside the vestibule when the plaintiff entered the building. …
“Landlords have a common-law duty to take minimal precautions to protect tenants from foreseeable harm, including foreseeable criminal conduct by a third person”… . “To establish foreseeability, there is no requirement that the past experience of criminal activity be of the same type as that to which the plaintiff was subjected” … . However, “the criminal conduct at issue must be shown to be reasonably predictable based on the prior occurrence of the same or similar criminal activity at a location sufficiently proximate to the subject location”… .
Here, the defendant established its prima facie entitlement to judgment as a matter of law by demonstrating that it lacked notice of any prior occurrences of the same or similar criminal activity at or near the subject premises … . George v 855 Ocean Ave., LLC, 2018 NY Slip Op 07100, Second Dept 10-24-18
NEGLIGENCE (LANDLORD-TENANT, THIRD PARTY ASSAULT, LANDLORD’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN THIS THIRD PARTY ASSAULT CASE PROPERLY GRANTED, TENANT WAS ASSAULTED IN THE BUILDING, ASSAULT WAS NOT FORESEEABLE (SECOND DEPT))/LANDLORD-TENANT (NEGLIGENCE, THIRD PARTY ASSAULT, LANDLORD’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN THIS THIRD PARTY ASSAULT CASE PROPERLY GRANTED, TENANT WAS ASSAULTED IN THE BUILDING, ASSAULT WAS NOT FORESEEABLE (SECOND DEPT))/THIRD PARTY ASSAULT (NEGLIGENCE, LANDLORD-TENANT, LANDLORD’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN THIS THIRD PARTY ASSAULT CASE PROPERLY GRANTED, TENANT WAS ASSAULTED IN THE BUILDING, ASSAULT WAS NOT FORESEEABLE (SECOND DEPT))/ ASSAULT, THIRD PARTY (NEGLIGENCE, LANDLORD-TENANT, LANDLORD’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN THIS THIRD PARTY ASSAULT CASE PROPERLY GRANTED, TENANT WAS ASSAULTED IN THE BUILDING, ASSAULT WAS NOT FORESEEABLE (SECOND DEPT))
