Court Opinion

ID: 9821101
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 07:49:21.342297+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:38:48.009926
License: Public Domain

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Geoffrey D. Wright, J.), entered April 7, 2014, which denied plaintiffs motion for partial summary judgment on his Labor Law §§ 240 (1) and 241 (6) claims, and, upon a search of the record, dismissed those claims, and granted defendants’ motions for summary judgment on their contractual indemnification claims against third-party defendant, modified, on the law, to reinstate the Labor Law § 240 (1) claim and grant plaintiff’s motion for partial summary judgment on that claim, and to deny defendant 222 Broadway, LLC’s (Broadway) motion for summary judgment on its contractual indemnification claim, and otherwise affirmed, without costs.
The motion court erred in dismissing the Labor Law § 240 (1) claim on the ground that third-party defendant (Knight) exclusively supervised and controlled plaintiffs work. “[0]wn-ers or contractors not actually involved in construction can be held liable, regardless of whether they exercise supervision or control over the work” (Blake v Neighborhood Hous. Servs. of N.Y. City, 1 NY3d 280, 287 [2003] [internal quotation marks and citation omitted]). Contrary to the motion court’s reading of Blake, the duties of the owner and contractor cannot be delegated (id. at 286-287).
*507Plaintiff established prima facie that the ladder from which he fell did not provide adequate protection pursuant to Labor Law § 240 (1). The evidence, including testimony from disinterested coworkers, shows that plaintiff was performing electrical work as part of a retrofitting or renovation, and was reaching up while standing on the third or fourth rung of a six-foot A-frame wooden ladder, when he received an electric shock from an exposed wire. He fell to the floor, holding the ladder, which remained in an open, locked position when it landed (see Vukovich v 1345 Fee, LLC, 61 AD3d 533 [1st Dept 2009] [summary judgment granted on Labor Law § 240 [1] claim, where plaintiff fell from an unsecured ladder after receiving electric shock while working as a pipe fitter]). While, as our concurring colleague points out, the ladder itself may not have been defective, it is not a requirement that a worker injured by a fall from an elevated height demonstrate that the safety device was defective or failed to comply with safety regulations (see Williams v 520 Madison Partnership, 38 AD3d 464, 465 [1st Dept 2007], citing Zimmer v Chemung County Performing Arts, 65 NY2d 513, 523 [1985]). The worker’s burden is to show that the absence of adequate safety devices, or the inadequacy of the safety devices provided to protect the worker from a fall, was a proximate cause of his or her injuries (see Smith v Hooker Chem. & Plastics Corp., 70 NY2d 994, 995 [1988] [absence of any safety device]; Rodriguez v Forest City Jay St. Assoc., 234 AD2d 68 [1st Dept 1996] [inadequate safety device]).
For instance, in Felker v Corning Inc. (90 NY2d 219, 224 [1997]), the Court analyzed two different elevation-related risks involved in the accident of a worker who, while painting an alcove area, fell from his ladder over an alcove wall ánd through a suspended ceiling. The first risk identified by the Court, the inherent risk caused by raising the worker to a height above the alcove wall, was sufficiently addressed by the defendants who provided a stepladder as an enumerated safety device, and there were no allegations that it “was defective, that it slipped, tipped, was placed improperly or otherwise failed to support plaintiff” (id.). The second risk was that the worker needed to reach over the alcove to paint in an elevated open area; for this task, there was a “complete failure to provide any safety device,” and there was no view of the evidence which could lead to the conclusion that the absence of a safety device, violating Labor Law § 240 (1), was not the proximate cause of the accident (id. at 225).
Blake v Neighborhood Hous. Servs., as noted by our concurring colleague, cautions that a case brought under Labor Law *508§ 240 (1) must show both a statutory violation, which includes the failure to provide a sufficient safety device, and that the violation was a contributing factor to the injury (1 NY3d at 289) . The mere fact that a worker falls from a ladder or a scaffolding is not enough, by itself, to establish that the device did not provide sufficient protection (id. [citations omitted]). The worker must show that Labor Law § 240 (1) was violated and the violation was a proximate cause of the injury (id.). In Blake, the plaintiff injured his ankle when the upper portion of his extension ladder retracted while he was using it; he testified that the ladder was stable and in proper working condition, and that he was not sure he had locked the extension clips in place before he ascended (id. at 283-284). Because the jury held that the ladder was adequate to have provided the necessary protection from a fall, the accident happened solely because of the way plaintiff used the ladder (id. at 284). The sole proximate cause of the accident was his negligence (id. at 290) .
Where a plaintiff makes a prima facie showing that a sufficient safety device was not provided, and its absence was a contributing factor to the injury, the burden shifts to the defendant to show that there is a plausible view of the evidence that there was no statutory violation and that the plaintiff’s own acts or omissions were the sole cause of the accident (Blake at 289 n 8, citing Klein v City of New York, 89 NY2d 833, 835 [1996]).
Here, plaintiff was injured when he was jolted by the electrical charge and although he hung onto the ladder, because it was not secured to something stable, it and he fell to the ground (see Vukovich v 1345 Fee, LLC, 61 AD3d at 533; Montalvo v J. Petrocelli Constr., Inc., 8 AD3d 173, 174 [1st Dept 2004]; Wasilewski v Museum of Modern Art, 260 AD2d 271, 271 [1st Dept 1999]; see also Kijak v 330 Madison Ave. Corp., 251 AD2d 152, 153 [1st Dept 1998] [“well settled that failure to properly secure a ladder, to ensure that it remain steady and erect while being used, constitutes a violation of Labor Law § 240 (l)”]).1 The lack of a secure ladder is a violation of Labor Law § 240 (1), and is a proximate cause of the accident (see Wise v 141 McDonald Ave., 297 AD2d 515, 516 [1st Dept 2002]).
Our conclusion follows the reasoning in Blake, and is in harmony with our decision in DelRosario v United Nations *509Fed. Credit Union (104 AD3d 515 [1st Dept 2013]), where we held that the ladder on which the plaintiff was working was inadequate to prevent him from falling when he was struck by a live electrical wire and, as he pulled away from the wire, the ladder “wobbled and moved” and caused him to lose his balance and fall (id. at 515). In DelRosario, the inadequacy of the ladder was held to be a proximate cause of his injury (id.). We therefore disagree with our concurring colleague that our holding in DelRosario has caused a split among the Appellate Divisions or deviates from the teachings of the Court of Appeals.
Defendants’ arguments that plaintiff caused his own injuries by working on the fixture without protective gloves before the power supply was turned off could at most establish comparative negligence, which is not a defense to a Labor Law § 240 (1) claim (see Stolt v General Foods Corp., 81 NY2d 918, 920 [1993]). Nor is there an issue of fact whether plaintiff’s injuries were caused by a fall from a ladder. Notwithstanding that the records of plaintiff’s visit to the emergency room refer merely to electrocution-related injuries without mentioning a fall from a ladder, and that plaintiff wrote on a medical form months later that his back injuries may have been caused by his lifting a machine and falling from a ladder, the evidence-which includes plaintiff’s, his coworker’s, and his foreman’s testimony -that he sustained his injuries in falling from a ladder is overwhelming (see Susko v 337 Greenwich LLC, 103 AD3d 434 [1st Dept 2013]).
Knight’s argument that plaintiff was not engaged in a activity covered by Labor Law § 240 (1) is unpreserved, and we decline to consider it. Contrary to Knight’s contention, this “is not a purely legal issue apparent on the face of the record but requires for resolution facts not brought to plaintiff’s attention on the motion” (Rodriguez v Coalition for Father Duffy, LLC, 112 AD3d 407, 408 [1st Dept 2013] [internal quotation marks omitted]).2
In light of our grant of partial summary judgment to plaintiff on his Labor Law § 240 (1) claim, we do not reach the issue whether the court correctly dismissed the Labor Law § 241 (6) *510claim (see Fanning v Rockefeller Univ., 106 AD3d 484, 485 [1st Dept 2013]).
Defendants Lime Energy Co. (Lime) and Jones Lang Lasalle Americas, Inc. (Jones) are entitled as a matter of law to contractual indemnification by Knight, since plaintiffs injuries arose out of the “Work” performed under the subcontract between Lime and Knight, which obligated Knight to indemnify Lime, and Jones as Lime’s “client,” for claims, liability, losses, and expenses “arising from the Work performed hereunder,” and, in light of the unchallenged dismissal of the Labor Law § 200 and common-law negligence claims against said defendants, their liability is purely vicarious (see Rainer v Gray-Line Dev. Co., LLC, 117 AD3d 634 [1st Dept 2014]). Contrary to Knight’s contention, the indemnity provision is not void under General Obligations Law § 5-322.1 because it requires Knight to indemnify Lime for its own negligence, since Lime was free of negligence (see Brown v Two Exch. Plaza Partners, 76 NY2d 172, 179 [1990]).
Broadway is not entitled to contractual indemnification by Knight since the indemnification clauses on which it relies are contained in contracts to which it was not a signatory and in which it was not named as an indemnitee (see Tonking v Port Auth. of N.Y. & N.J., 3 NY3d 486, 490 [2004]; Sicilia v City of New York, 127 AD3d 628 [1st Dept 2015]). Nor is there any basis for a finding that Lime and Knight intended Broadway to be a third-party beneficiary of their subcontract, which referred to a different entity as the property owner and did not mention Broadway (see Naughton v City of New York, 94 AD3d 1, 12 [1st Dept 2012]).
We have considered the parties’ remaining arguments for affirmative relief and find them unavailing. Concur — Renwick, Moskowitz, Manzanet-Daniels and Feinman, JJ.

. We note that one of plaintiff’s coworkers averred that none of the workers, including plaintiff, was provided a safety belt, possibly an additional safety device to use while working on the ladders (id.).

. The concurring opinion questions whether any type of safety devices enumerated in Labor Law § 240 (1), could adequately protect against the force of electricity which is capable of knocking down a worker from any location. It queries whether the Legislature intended that Labor Law § 240 (1), designed to protect workers from the danger posed by the force of gravity, should be applied to the danger represented by the force of electricity. There is nothing to suggest, however, that falls from elevated surfaces following contact with live electricity, should be carved out from the statute.