The building owner's getting off here.

Plaintiff was injured when, just after the doors closed, an elevator suddenly fell four floors. The First Department dismissed the complaint as against the building's owner, in Hodges v. Royal Realty Corp., which was decided on July 12, 2007.

The court noted that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur may be invoked in an action involving a malfunctioning elevator, but only if it can be established that (1) the elevator's sudden fall would not ordinarily occur absent negligence; (2) when the elevator fell, it was within the defendant's exclusive control; and (3) plaintiff did not contribute to the elevator's fall in any way.

Here, the court found that the owner did not have exclusive control of the elevator. The court pointed to a service contract which required defendant-elevator company to maintain the elevators in a proper and safe operating condition, perform periodic inspections, repair all defects and provide on site a full-time elevator mechanic whose sole responsibility was to care for and maintain the building's elevators.

The United States Bankruptcy Court authorized the debtor to bring this action, on behalf of the bankruptcy trustee, to recover damages for legal malpractice against the debtor's original attorneys. Initially, the debtor, and not the bankruptcy trustee, was named as a party-plaintiff. The Second Department held that the inadvertent designation was a mere mistake which could be corrected pursuant to CPLR 2001, in Silverman v. Flaum, which was decided on July 10, 2007.

The court found that defendants would not be prejudiced, and noted that the statute authorizes the court to correct a mistake, omission, defect, or irregularity at any stage of an action.

They should have called housekeeping.

Plaintiff allegedly slipped and fell on a green substance on the floor of defendant's store. Although there were no witnesses to the accident, an assistant store manager observed the green substance on the floor shortly after plaintiff's fall and, in her accident report, noted that it had come from a small bottle of fragrance oil which had fallen from a plastic display attached to a shelf.

In Chetuti v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., which was decided on July 10, 2007, the Second Department found this sufficient to raise a triable issue of fact as to whether defendant had created the alleged dangerous condition or, in the alternative, whether defendant had actual or constructive notice of its existence.

The First Department denied petitioner's request for a preliminary injunction enjoining respondents from importing and marketing a certain product, and from disclosing or using any confidential information which had been obtained in their business relationship, in OraSure v. Prestige Brands Holdings, which was decided on July 12, 2007.

The court noted that, in order to merit injunctive relief, petitioner was required to make a clear showing that (1) it would likely succeed on the merits, (2) it will suffer irreparable injury unless the relief sought is granted, and (3) the balancing of equities is in its favor. Here, petitioner's damages were calculable, and, as a matter of law, a monetary harm which can be compensated by damages does not constitute irreparable injury.

Made in New York.

Defendant is a Pennsylvania lawyer who was retained by a New York resident to represent him in a probate matter in Connecticut. Defendant collected more than $400,000 in legal fees and allegedly appropriated a $200,000 "success fee" from the proceeds of a settlement which defendant procured. After his death, the client's estate commenced this action to recover a substantial portion of the legal fees, alleging that they were excessive. The estate also seeks the return of the success fee. The First Department denied defendant's motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction, in Scheuer v. Schwartz, which was decided on July 5, 2007. Even though the retainer agreement was not executed in New York, the court found that, in performing the agreement, defendant's contacts with New York were sufficient to merit long-arm jurisdiction pursuant to CPLR 302(a)(1). The court noted that defendant made at least ten trips to New York in connection with the matter, and that, among other things, he reviewed documents in the offices of his client's former attorneys and had several meetings with both his client and his client's adversaries in the probate proceeding. Defendant billed approximately 70 hours for work performed in New York, representing approximately 8% of the approximate 824 total hours billed for the Connecticut matter.

In this personal injury matter, plaintiff offered a new theory of negligence by way of a supplemental bill of particulars, which was served without leave of the court and after the note of issue had been filed. The Second Department said it was too late, in Medina v. Sears, Roebuck, which was decided on June 26, 2007. Noting that a plaintiff may successfully oppose a summary judgment motion by relying on an unpleaded cause of action which is supported by plaintiff's submissions, the court said that the "protracted delay" in this instance warranted dismissal.

Extortion with an E.

There is no private cause of action for extortion or attempted extortion, according to the First Department, in Minnelli v. Soumayah, which was decided on June 28, 2007. In dismissing that cause of action, in which plaintiff had alleged that defendant had compelled her to deliver money to him by threatening physical harm to plaintiff and her employees, the court observed that "extortionate behavior, coercion and duress may be elements of a cause of action for tortious interference with contract or unjust enrichment." The court also said that a mere threat, without something forcing the other party to give in to a further demand, is insufficient to make out a cause of action sounding in economic duress.

Pursuant to a contract, plaintiff markets, sells, and distributes defendant's beverages to retail outlets in a specifically designated geographic area of Manhattan. He brought a breach of contract action after defendant entered into agreements to directly sell its products to public schools and certain municipal entities. The Second Department dismissed the complaint, in McGuckin v. Snapple Distribs., Inc., which was decided on June 26, 2007. The court found that the contract, by its express terms, allowed defendant to market, sell, and distribute products to institutional accounts such as public schools and municipal entities. That was enough for the court, which said that the contact should be given effect according to its plain meaning.

Plaintiff was stuck in an elevator in the building where he worked as a porter. Against the building's superintendent's express directions, plaintiff climbed out of the elevator and was injured when the elevator began to move again. Plaintiff was terminated and, at an unemployment hearing, it was determined that plaintiff had been fired for misconduct in disobeying his building superintendent's direct order. That finding did not preclude plaintiff's suing for his injuries, though, according to the First Department, in Pelzer v. Transel Elevator & Electric, which was decided on June 28, 2007. The court noted that administrative agency determinations are binding in subsequent legal actions for purposes of issue preclusion, but only as to the precise issues which the agency decided. Here, the agency's finding was limited to the matter of plaintiff's misconduct, and did not address the issues of sole proximate cause and assumption of risk, which were pivotal to the subsequent lawsuit.

Plaintiff alleged (1) a failure to pay commissions as required by his written employment contract with defendant-LLC, a New York corporation with its principal place of business in New York City, and (2) certain violations of the Labor Law. In Fieldman v. Smart Choice Communications, which was decided on June 28, 2007, the First Department said that the contract's New Jersey choice-of-law provision runs to the Labor Law causes of action since they did not assert "an extra-contractual wrong, such as payment of commissions in accordance with the contract but in violation of section 191(a)(1)(c) because made less frequently than once a month."

What's in a name?

Avon did not misappropriate the name of the landlord's building in violation of the parties' agreement, according to the First Department, in Avon Products v. Solow, which was decided on June 28, 2007. "Although two of the four documents relied upon by Solow tend to show that Avon did refer to the building as the 'Avon Building' in communications to persons outside the Avon organization, that is not sufficient to establish Avon's misappropriation of the building's name. The remaining two documents, letters to Diesel Construction and the New York City Board of Trade, are inconsequential and could not reasonably have been viewed as tipping the balance in Solow's favor."