Case Name: Kendra Cividanes, Respondent, v. City of New York, Defendant, and Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority et al., Appellants
Court: New York Court of Appeals
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 2012-11-29
Citations: 20 N.Y.3d 925
Docket Number: 
Parties: Kendra Cividanes, Respondent, v City of New York, Defendant, and Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority et al., Appellants.
Judges: 
Reporter: New York Reports
Volume: 20
Pages: 925–928

Head Matter:
[981 NE2d 281, 957 NYS2d 685]
Kendra Cividanes, Respondent, v City of New York, Defendant, and Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority et al., Appellants.
Decided November 29, 2012
APPEARANCES OF COUNSEL
Lawrence A. Silver, Brooklyn, and Wallace D. Gossett, for appellants.
Burns & Harris, New York City (Blake G. Goldfarb of counsel), for respondent.

Opinion:
OPINION OF THE COURT
Memorandum.
The order of the Appellate Division should be affirmed, with costs, and the certified question answered in the affirmative.
Plaintiff Kendra Cividanes testified at a General Municipal Law § 50-h hearing that she injured her left ankle when she "stepped off the last step into a hole and fell" as she exited the rear of a bus owned and operated by defendants New York City Transit Authority and Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority. The Appellate Division properly held that the No-Fault Insurance Law is inapplicable because plaintiffs injury did not arise out of the "use or operation" of a motor vehicle (Insurance Law § 5104 [a]). The "use or operation" of the bus was neither a "proximate cause" nor an "instrumentality" that produced plaintiffs injury (see Walton v Lumbermens Mut. Cas. Co., 88 NY2d 211, 214 [1996] [noting that the No-Fault Insurance Law's scope of coverage should be interpreted to "reflect the Legislature's intent to draw a line between motor vehicle accidents and all other types of torts and to remove only the former from the domain of common-law tort litigation"]). Manuel v New York City Tr. Auth. (82 AD3d 1059 [2d Dept 2011]), which held on similar facts that the No-Fault Insurance Law's restrictions on tort liability were applicable, should not be followed.