A New York state appellate court has ruled in favor of a construction worker who misidentified the location of his accident when he filed a labor law claim.
Tito Vidal said he was injured in 2009 while installing drywall at a T-Mobile store in lower Manhattan after the scaffolding he was standing on collapsed. On July 22, 2011, Mr. Vidal filed a labor law claim seeking damages for personal injuries from T-Mobile USA Inc. as well as Claremont 99 Wall L.L.C., the owner of the building that contained the T-Mobile store located at 99 Wall St.
In 2013, after it became apparent that the alleged injuries occurred at another T-Mobile store located at 125 Maiden Lane, Mr. Vidal sought to amend his complaint.
T-Mobile objected to the amendment, and the Kings County Supreme Court denied Mr. Vidal's motion to change the location on his complaint.
In its ruling issued Jan. 19, the 2nd Department of the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division backed Mr. Vidal and ruled that T-Mobile failed to establish that changing the address on the complaint would prejudice the company in a meaningful way.
“T-Mobile does not deny that it was constructing a store at 125 Maiden Lane using the plaintiff's employer as a contractor,” the ruling states. “With minimal effort upon receiving a complaint regarding the construction of a store in downtown Manhattan, T-Mobile could have ascertained the location of the subject accident.”
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