Joseph Adonis v. North American Demo & Excavation Corp.,Grant Forbell and Empire Developers Corp.; Grant Forbell and Empire Developers v. North American Contracting

Plaintiff, an employee of third-party defendant North American Contracting, alleged he was injured by a falling rock at a construction site, resulting in a fracture of the right tibia. We represented defendants Grant Forbell, owner of the premises, and Empire Developers, general contractor for the project. Empire had contracted North American for excavation, which included digging the foundation and handling excavated material. Forbell and Empire did not supervise the area of the incident and had no prior notice of unsafe practices by North American. We argued that negligence and Labor Law Section 200 claims against them should be dismissed.

The work involved typical construction site risks and did not meet the elevated risks of Labor Law Section 240(1). There was no evidence of the rock falling from a height or being hoisted. Violations of New York Industrial Code Section 23-1.7(a) were irrelevant as they pertain to different circumstances. Section 23-1(b) lacks specificity to support a Labor Law Section 241(6) claim. We argued against the applicability of cited Industrial Code sections and requested dismissal of the Section 241(6) claim.

The Court granted our motion, dismissing all claims against Forbell and Empire. Regarding the Labor Law Section 240 claim, the Court ruled that the falling rock did not meet the statute's criteria. For the Section 241(6) claim, the Court dismissed most Industrial Code violations for lacking specificity and OSHA standards as insufficient grounds for liability under this section of the Labor Law.