Opinion
No. 2014–1909 RIC.
04-25-2016
Michael LOWNEY and Ruth Lowney, Respondents, v. Lenore ARCE, Appellant.
Appeal from an order of the Civil Court of the City of New York, Richmond County (Orlando Marrazzo, Jr., J.), entered April 24, 2014. The order denied defendant's motion to open her default.
ORDERED that the order is reversed, without costs, and defendant's motion to open her default is granted.
In this action, which was commenced in Supreme Court and removed to Civil Court pursuant to CPLR 325(d), plaintiffs' amended complaint seeks to recover damages for, among other things, libel. Defendant denied the allegations of the complaint and appeared in court on a number of occasions but thereafter defaulted in appearing, following which an inquest was held and plaintiffs were awarded the principal sum of $124,720. Defendant subsequently moved to open her default, pursuant to CPLR 5015(a)(1), which motion was denied by the Civil Court.
It is well settled that a party seeking to open its default pursuant to CPLR 5015(a)(1) must demonstrate a reasonable excuse for the default and the existence of a meritorious cause of action or defense (see Eugene Di Lorenzo, Inc. v. A.C. Dutton Lbr. Co., 67 N.Y.2d 138, 141 [1986] ). Here, in support of her motion, defendant explained that she had failed to appear in court because she had had a severe nose bleed. As a meritorious defense, defendant stated that the assertions that she had made about plaintiff Michael Lowney, which assertions were the basis for plaintiffs' cause of action for libel, were true. In view of the foregoing, and since truth is a defense to a cause of action for libel (see Goldberg v. Levine, 97 AD3d 725 [2012] ), we conclude that defendant demonstrated a reasonable excuse for her default and an arguably meritorious defense.
Accordingly, the order is reversed and defendant's motion to open her default is granted.
ELLIOT, J.P., WESTON and SOLOMON, JJ., concur.