Vazquez v New York City Hous. Auth.

Vazquez v New York City Hous. Auth. 2010 NY Slip Op 09552 [79 AD3d 623] December 28, 2010 Appellate Division, First Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. As corrected through Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Jesse Vazquez, Respondent,
v
New York City Housing Authority, Appellant.

—[*1] Herzfeld & Rubin P.C., New York (Miriam Skolnik of counsel), for appellant.

Pollack, Pollack, Isaac & DeCicco, New York (Brian J. Isaac of counsel), for respondent.

Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Alison Y. Tuitt, J.), entered June 12, 2009, which denied defendant's motion to compel disclosure and granted plaintiff's cross motion for a protective order, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

The motion court properly declined to compel the disclosure of plaintiff's siblings' medical and academic records since defendant "fail[ed] to offer any expert evidence establishing a particularized need for inquiry into such matters not placed at issue by the complaint" (Mendez v Equities By Marcy, 24 AD3d 138 [2005]). Nothing more than speculation supports defendant's assertion that the mental condition of the siblings has any bearing on plaintiff's condition, particularly since plaintiff's claim is that the exposure to lead exacerbated his pervasive developmental disorder (PDD), not that it actually caused the PDD. Defendant submitted an affidavit by an expert who stated that the requested records would assist him in addressing plaintiff's condition, but never addressed the affidavit by plaintiff's expert, who rebutted defendant's expert's affidavit in detail and stated that plaintiff's medical and academic records from before his alleged exposure to lead were "more than adequate" for the purpose of drawing diagnostic and prognostic conclusions concerning plaintiff's condition after the alleged lead paint exposure. Concur—Gonzalez, P.J., Mazzarelli, Sweeny, Richter and Manzanet-Daniels, JJ.