Opinion
November 24, 1986
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Kings County (Kramer, J.).
Ordered that the appeal from the order dated August 20, 1985, is dismissed, as that order was superseded by the order dated January 16, 1986, made upon reargument; and it is further,
Ordered that the order dated January 16, 1986, is reversed insofar as reviewed, on the law, with one bill of costs payable by the plaintiffs-respondents, the order dated August 20, 1985, is vacated, and, upon reargument, the plaintiffs' motion for leave to serve an amended notice of claim is denied, the cross motion is granted, and the complaint is dismissed as against the city.
The original notice of claim served in the present case was patently defective since it failed to describe with sufficient particularity "the place where and the manner in which the claim arose" (General Municipal Law § 50-e; see also, Levine v City of New York, 111 A.D.2d 785, 786; Caselli v City of New York, 105 A.D.2d 251, 253). Although a court may grant a motion for leave to amend a notice of claim, it may do so only where two conditions have been satisfied: first, the mistake, omission, irregularity or defect in the notice must have been made in good faith, and second, it must appear that the public corporation has not been prejudiced thereby (see, General Municipal Law § 50-e; Mazza v City of New York, 112 A.D.2d 921; Caselli v City of New York, supra, at p 254; Nouri v City of New York, 90 A.D.2d 745, 746).
In the present case, there is no allegation that the original notice was prepared in bad faith. However, the city was clearly prejudiced because the defect in the notice of claim deprived it of the opportunity to conduct the type of prompt and adequate investigation contemplated by General Municipal Law § 50-e (see, O'Brien v City of Syracuse, 54 N.Y.2d 353, 358; Mazza v City of New York, supra). Therefore, Special Term improvidently exercised its discretion when it granted the plaintiffs' motion for leave to amend their notice of claim and denied the city's cross motion to dismiss the complaint as against it. Mangano, J.P., Weinstein, Lawrence and Eiber, JJ., concur.