DIAZ v. DEJESUS (2026)

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Myrna Socorro, J.), entered January 13, 2026, which granted the motion of defendant Jonathan DeJesus for summary judgment on the issue of his liability, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

Summary judgment in favor of DeJesus was warranted because he demonstrated the absence of a triable issue of fact as to his negligence through his deposition testimony that he was stopped at an intersection at the time his car was sideswiped by a bus.  In response, defendants New York City Transit Authority and Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority failed to raise a material issue of fact.  The bus driver's denial that his bus was involved in an accident on March 19, 2019, was insufficient to raise a material issue of fact concerning DeJesus' liability.  Although there was a conflict between the versions of the accident as recounted by DeJesus and plaintiff, a passenger in DeJesus' car, on one hand, and the bus driver, on the other, the testimony that DeJesus' car was stopped at the intersection at the time it was sideswiped was unrefuted.  Nor does the discrepancy in the testimony of plaintiff and DeJesus regarding the location of the accident – which street within the intersection the car was stopped on – raise a triable issue of fact because this discrepancy has no bearing on DeJesus' alleged negligence.  Moreover, neither the Transit defendants nor plaintiff presented evidence from which DeJesus' negligence may be inferred (see Derdiarian v Felix Contr.  Corp., 51 NY2d 308, 315 [1980];  Nallan v Helmsley–Spear, Inc., 50 NY2d 507, 520 [1980] ).