PRIESTER v. American Transit Insurance Company, Defendant. (2024)

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Ben R. Barbato, J.), entered June 13, 2023, which denied the motion of defendants-appellants Ramone Harrison and Davia A. Anderson (collectively appellants) for summary judgment on the issue of liability, unanimously reversed, on the law, without costs, the motion granted, and the complaint dismissed.  The Clerk is directed to enter judgment dismissing the complaint.

Plaintiff commenced this action for serious injuries he allegedly sustained when he was a passenger in a motor vehicle that was struck by appellants’ vehicle.  Appellants thereafter moved for summary judgment dismissing the complaint against them on the ground that plaintiff did not sustain a serious injury within the meaning of Insurance Law § 5102(d).  While that motion was pending, appellants brought a second summary judgment motion seeking dismissal of the complaint on the ground that they were not liable for the accident.

Appellants are entitled to summary judgment on the ground that they are not liable for the subject accident.¹

As noted by Supreme Court, it is axiomatic that successive summary judgment motions are disfavored.  Parties may not make “successive fragmentary attacks upon a cause of action but must assert all available grounds when moving for summary judgment” (Levitz v. Robbins Music Corp., 17 A.D.2d 801, 801, 232 N.Y.S.2d 769 [1st Dept. 1962];  see Jones v. 636 Holding Corp., 73 A.D.3d 409, 409, 899 N.Y.S.2d 605 [1st Dept. 2010], citing Phoenix Four, Inc. v. Albertini, 245 A.D.2d 166, 665 N.Y.S.2d 893 [1st Dept. 1997]).

As stated by this Court in Levitz,

“Parties will not be permitted to make successive fragmentary attacks upon a cause of action but must assert all available grounds when moving for summary judgment.  There can be no reservation of any issue to be used upon any subsequent motion for summary judgment.  A court, upon a motion for summary judgment, must examine all of the facts presented by the affidavits, pleadings and documents and decide whether a triable issue is raised.  Once having done so, a court may not on a subsequent motion consider matter which a party has withheld or failed to urge as a ground for summary judgment theretofore denied” (17 A.D.2d at 801, 232 N.Y.S.2d 769).

Here, appellants’ first motion for summary judgment was on the issue of serious injury.  Their second motion was on the issue of liability.  The issue of whether plaintiff sustained a serious injury within the meaning of the Insurance Law, “is a threshold matter separate from the issue of fault” and which must, therefore, be determined separately (Reid v. Brown, 308 A.D.2d 331, 332, 764 N.Y.S.2d 260 [1st Dept. 2003]).  “[S]erious injury is quintessentially an issue of damages, not liability” (Van Nostrand v. Froehlich, 44 A.D.3d 54, 62, 844 N.Y.S.2d 293 [2d Dept. 2007], appeal dismissed 10 N.Y.3d 837, 859 N.Y.S.2d 609, 889 N.E.2d 486 [2008];  see also Shinn v. Catanzaro, 1 A.D.3d 195, 767 N.Y.S.2d 88 [1st Dept. 2003]).  Under the facts presented, appellants’ failure to raise the issue of liability in their first motion for summary judgment does not run afoul of the general disfavor of successive motions since the issue of serious injury was not germane to the issue of liability (see Elie v. City of New York, 33 Misc.3d 958, 935 N.Y.S.2d 252 [Sup. Ct., Queens County 2011] [permitting separate summary judgment motions on liability and serious injury threshold because they are based on different legal theories]).

Appellants have also established the existence of sufficient cause (see Varsity Tr., Inc. v. Board of Educ. of City of N.Y., 300 A.D.2d 38, 39, 752 N.Y.S.2d 603 [1st Dept. 2002]).  Here, the record indicates that the first motion for summary judgment was filed prior to the deposition testimony of defendant-respondent Phanor.  In his testimony Phanor admitted that he swerved into appellant's vehicle in order to avoid another unidentified vehicle.  While appellant Harrison's deposition testimony, which was taken prior to the filing of the first motion, offered a similar narrative, Phanor's testimony clearly established that Phanor was the sole proximate cause of the accident and there was no issue of fact that appellant Harrison could have avoided the collision.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Plaintiff did not oppose appellants’ second summary judgment motion and has not responded to the appeal.