Opinion
12303 Index No. 28280/18E Case No. 2020-02116
11-10-2020
Ivelisse CORREA, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. CITY OF NEW YORK et al., Defendants–Respondents.
Kreisberg & Maitland, LLP, New York (Jeffrey L. Kreisberg of counsel), for appellant. James E. Johnson, Corporation Counsel, New York (Kate Fletcher of counsel), for respondents.
Kreisberg & Maitland, LLP, New York (Jeffrey L. Kreisberg of counsel), for appellant.
James E. Johnson, Corporation Counsel, New York (Kate Fletcher of counsel), for respondents.
Manzanet–Daniels, J.P., Kapnick, Mazzarelli, Moulton, JJ.
Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Mitchell J. Danziger, J.), entered on or about November 19, 2019, which granted defendants' motion to dismiss the complaint pursuant to CPLR 3211, unanimously affirmed, without costs.
Plaintiff alleges that defendants discriminated against her on the basis of disability when they terminated her employment shortly after she revealed to her immediate supervisor that she was being treated for depression. The complaint alleges that before the revelation was made, plaintiff had been investigated for violating certain of defendants' policies and procedures (of which the record shows she was aware).
The complaint fails to state a cause of action under the State and City Human Rights Laws because it alleges no facts from which it can be inferred that plaintiff's disability was a factor in the termination of her employment (see Farkas v. River House Realty Co., Inc. , 173 A.D.3d 405, 103 N.Y.S.3d 376 [1st Dept. 2019] ). The complaint does not allege that anyone other than plaintiff's immediate supervisor was aware of her disability or that the supervisor was consulted about the termination (see Anonymous v. Mount Sinai Hosp. , 164 A.D.3d 1167, 1168, 82 N.Y.S.3d 408 [1st Dept. 2018], lv denied 32 N.Y.3d 913, 93 N.Y.S.3d 259, 117 N.E.3d 818 [2019] ). To the extent plaintiff relies on the temporal proximity between her revelation to her supervisor of her disability and her termination from employment, it does not avail her in the absence of any allegations suggesting a causal connection between the two events (see Koester v. New York Blood Ctr. , 55 A.D.3d 447, 449, 866 N.Y.S.2d 87 [1st Dept. 2008] ).