Case Results
Gordon & Silber Obtains Defense Verdict for Restaurant and Owner of Airport in Slip and Fall Claim — October 2006.
Type of Case: Slip and Fall. Alleged failure to clear a coffee spill
for that had been on the floor for at least 25 minutes.
Venue: New York Supreme Court, Queens County.
Background Facts: Plaintiff claimed that she entered the restaurant at
6:10 a.m. and ordered a bagel and paid for it. She claimed that she
then advised the cashier of a large coffee spill on the floor by the
condiment area. She then sat down and ate her bagel and read her
newspaper. 25 minutes later she claimed she slipped and fell on the same
coffee condition while walking out of the restaurant. Plaintiff
suffered a badly fractured and dislocated ankle that required two
surgeries.
Special Problems: One of our principal witnesses was in Texas doing
Homeland Security training. We had to have him flown from Texas to
testify on the last day of the trial.
Our Strategy: We argued that the plaintiff had concocted the entire
story. That the floor was clean and dry, that she had not been in the
restaurant for 25 minutes, but had purchased the bagel moments before
the accident and that she fell turning from the cashier after receiving
her change. We called as witnesses, the cashier, the Port Authority
police officer who investigated the accident, as well as the Emergency
Medical Technician and coworker of the plaintiff who came to her aid.
Result: The jury came back with a defense verdict finding that our
client was not negligent. An interview with one of the jurors revealed
that the jury did not find the plaintiff's testimony credible. What
particularly impressed the jury was that plaintiff testified that she
regularly read the newspaper in the restaurant every morning, but on
cross-examination, she admitted that she did not in fact eat there
regularly. This was critical in view of the dispute as to whether she
had consumed the bagel prior to falling. In addition, the jury found it
critical that the police officer's memo book listed a bagel as one of
her possessions.
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