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Recent Developments: Appeals Court Reverses Lower Court Decision Throwing Out Plaintiff's Car Accident Case

In a decision issued on March 25, 2015, the appeals court that covers Long Island and parts of NYC reversed a decision by a lower court that threw out a car accident case brought by an injured plaintiff.

The plaintiff was a passenger in a car that was struck in the rear by someone driving a vehicle with dealer plates for Bay Ridge Lexus. As is not unusual, the driver of the dealer car (who could be an employee or manager at Bay Ridge) apparently told the driver of the other car, no, don't call the cops; this is a dealer car; take your car to Bay Ridge, and they'll fix it. However, the plaintiff passenger was physically injured and eventually sued Bay Ridge, its related companies, and the other driver.

Because the cops were not called, and for whatever other reason, Bay Ridge had no record of the accident. The defendants then used this lack of a record on their end to make a motion to dismiss plaintiff's case. (Did they think the plaintiff was making the whole thing up?)

The defendants won before the lower court, and plaintiff's case was thrown out. But the appeals court said, no, you can't win on a motion to dismiss (called a motion for summary judgment when you argue the facts) just by pointing out holes in a plaintiff's case. Besides, witnesses in the front car saw that the car that hit them had Bay Ridge Lexus plates, and Bay Ridge admitted that it owns a car with those plates. We'll let a jury decide what happened.

The appeals court got it right. The lower court decision siding with the defendants was a bit baffling. And if you think you are injured in a car accident, you need to call the police so they can come and create an accident report. It would have avoided this entire mess.

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