Summary
In Martinez v. Pinard (1st Dept 2018), involved an appeal from a pre-Santana case, which permitted exclusion of non-attorney IME's, the Martinez Court rejected plaintiff's claim that Defendant's waived its right to a physical, citing to Kattaria and IME Watchdog (the Appellate decision on the preliminary injunction in the present case), finding that defendant's conduct in serving its Notices was supported by a good faith interpretation of the applicable case law.
Summary of this case from Watchdog v. Baker, Mcevoy, Morrissey & Moskovits, P.C.Opinion
6233N Index 20797/16
04-05-2018
Richard MARTINEZ, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. Leverne C. PINARD, et al., Defendants, Eduard R. Ventura de Leon, et al., Defendants–Respondents.
Daniella Levi & Associates, P.C., Fresh Meadows (Daniella Levi of counsel), for appellant. Mauro Lilling Naparty, LLP, Woodbury (Seth M. Weinberg of counsel), for respondents.
Daniella Levi & Associates, P.C., Fresh Meadows (Daniella Levi of counsel), for appellant.
Mauro Lilling Naparty, LLP, Woodbury (Seth M. Weinberg of counsel), for respondents.
Acosta, P.J., Tom, Oing, Moulton, JJ.
Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Laura G. Douglas, J.), entered August 3, 2017, which, to the extent appealed from as limited by the briefs, granted defendants Eduard R. Ventura de Leon and Crida Car, Inc.'s (defendants) motion to preclude plaintiff from being accompanied by a nonlegal representative at a defense physical examination, and denied plaintiff's cross motion to deem defendants to have waived a physical examination or, in the alternative, to be permitted to have a nonlegal representative of his choosing present at the examination, unanimously reversed, on the law, without costs, defendants' motion denied, and plaintiff's cross motion to be permitted to have a representative of his choosing present at his physical examination granted.Defendants concede that, under this Court's recent decision in Santana v. Johnson, 154 A.D.3d 452, 60 N.Y.S.3d 831 (1st Dept. 2017), they can no longer argue that plaintiff was required to show "special and unusual circumstances" to be permitted to have a nonlegal representative present at a physical examination conducted on their behalf pursuant to CPLR 3121.
There is no basis for finding that defendants waived their right to conduct a physical examination of plaintiff by including unreasonable restrictions in their notice of examination. Defendants' conduct was supported by a good faith interpretation of applicable case law (see Kattaria v. Rosado, 146 A.D.3d 457, 458, 43 N.Y.S.3d 758 [1st Dept. 2017] ; IME Watchdog, Inc. v. Baker, McEvoy, Morrissey & Moskovits, P.C., 145 A.D.3d 464, 44 N.Y.S.3d 9 [1st Dept. 2016] ).