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SNOWPLOW DRIVER WAS EXEMPT FROM STANDARD NEGLIGENCE AND DID NOT ACT RECKLESSLY IN THIS TRAFFIC ACCIDENT CASE, COURT OF CLAIMS REVERSED (THIRD DEPT).

The Third Department, reversing the Court of Claims, determined the snowplow driver was not liable in this traffic accident case. The highway-work exemption from standard negligence applied and the driver was not reckless:

There is little dispute that the Court of Claims erred in applying Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1104, which affords certain privileges to “[t]he driver of an authorized emergency vehicle, when involved in an emergency operation” … and has no applicability to a vehicle such as a snowplow put to its intended use . The pertinent statute is instead Vehicle and Traffic Law § 1103 (b), which “exempts from the rules of the road all vehicles . . . which are ‘actually engaged …  in work on a highway,’ and imposes on such vehicles a recklessness standard of care” … . Inasmuch as “the snowplow [here] was clearing the road during a snowstorm” when the accident occurred, both the snowplow and its driver are exempted “from the rules of the road” … . As such, liability will only attach if defendant and its employees behaved in a reckless manner, meaning a “conscious disregard of ‘a known or obvious risk that was so great as to make it highly probable that harm would follow'” … . Howell v State of New York, 2019 NY Slip Op 01281, Third Dept 2-21-19

 

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