Opinion
May 31, 1994
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Suffolk County (Cannavo, J.).
Ordered that the order is modified, on the law, by deleting the provision thereof denying those branches of the defendants' motion for summary judgment which were to dismiss the first and third causes of action, and substituting therefor a provision granting those branches of the motion; as so modified, the order is affirmed insofar as appealed and cross-appealed from, with costs to the defendants.
The plaintiff was terminated from her at will employment at defendant Good Samaritan Hospital for incompetence based upon a specific incident involving an allegedly "unsatisfactory" summary report she submitted to the hospital's President, Daniel Walsh. The plaintiff commenced this action, alleging that the reasons given for her termination were a pretext for the defendants' real reasons which were to replace her with younger, less well-paid employees and that the defendants' publication of the reasons for her termination to other hospital employees and the vicious manner of the termination constituted, respectively, defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
The Supreme Court denied those branches of the defendants' motion for summary judgment which were to dismiss the causes of action sounding in age discrimination, finding, inter alia, that the plaintiff was entitled to complete discovery. We disagree. The plaintiff has not specified admissible and legally sufficient facts needed to raise an inference of age discrimination. The specific factual allegations that the plaintiff contends would be supported by this additional discovery are collateral to the question of whether her termination was based upon discrimination. Accordingly, the plaintiff has failed to demonstrate how further discovery might reveal the existence of material facts, currently within the exclusive knowledge and control of the defendants, which would warrant the denial of summary judgment (see, CPLR 3212 [f]; Kracker v. Spartan Chem. Co., 183 A.D.2d 810, 813; Home Sav. Bank v. Arthurkill Assocs., 173 A.D.2d 776, 777).
Furthermore, the plaintiff has failed to indicate that she made any reasonable effort during the 18 months from joinder of issue to the defendants' motion for summary judgment to ascertain facts which would give rise to triable issues (see, Rodriguez v. City of New York, 144 A.D.2d 352, 354).
We find that there is no merit to the plaintiff's contentions made on her cross appeal concerning dismissal of her causes of action for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress (see, Dos v. St. John's Episcopal Hosp., 199 A.D.2d 460; Callas v. Eisenberg, 192 A.D.2d 349, 350). Thompson, J.P., Rosenblatt, Pizzuto and Florio, JJ., concur.