Jones v Crown Nursing Home Assoc., Inc.

[*1] Jones v Crown Nursing Home Assoc., Inc. 2009 NY Slip Op 51027(U) [23 Misc 3d 141(A)] Decided on May 22, 2009 Appellate Term, Second Department Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431. This opinion is uncorrected and will not be published in the printed Official Reports.

Decided on May 22, 2009
SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
APPELLATE TERM: 2nd, 11th and 13th JUDICIAL DISTRICTS
PRESENT: : WESTON, J.P., GOLIA and RIOS, JJ
2008-553 K C.

Audrey L. Jones, Appellant,

against

Crown Nursing Home Associates, Inc. Respondent.

Appeal from a judgment of the Civil Court of the City of New York, Kings County (Ellen M. Spodek, J.), entered January 2, 2008. The judgment, after a nonjury trial, dismissed the action.

Judgment affirmed without costs.
In this small claims action, plaintiff, who had worked for defendant as a registered nurse, seeks to recover pay allegedly due her. The trial of this action had previously been adjourned. At trial, after first unsuccessfully seeking an additional adjournment, plaintiff testified that she had been employed by defendant Crown Nursing Home Associates, Inc. (Crown) pursuant to an oral contract, and had voluntarily terminated her employment with defendant effective June 11, 2007 due to
disability. She claimed entitlement to an additional 15 days of pay for accrued, unused vacation time, one unpaid "registered nurse's day," and one unpaid sick day. However, plaintiff presented no documentary evidence in support of these claims, nor did she present clear evidence respecting the time at which she gave notice to Crown of her resignation. Richard Pottinger, defendant's director of marketing, did not address plaintiff's claims concerning the accrual of vacation days, but testified that plaintiff had failed to give two weeks' notice of her resignation, as required by Crown, and that according to Crown's policies, the penalty for insufficient notice was the forfeiture of accrued vacation time.
Plaintiff's contention on appeal, that her state and federal rights to due process were violated by the trial court's refusal to grant her an adjournment, is unfounded. The determination whether to adjourn a trial is addressed to the discretion of the trial court and will not be interfered with in the [*2]absence of clear abuse (Blunt v Northern Oneida County Landfill (NOCO), 145 AD2d 913 [1988]; accord e.g. Mirzoeff v Nagar, 52 AD3d 789 [2008]; Newmark v Animal Emergency Clinic of Hudson Val., 38 AD3d 1110 [2007]). Nor is there any reason to upset the decision of the Civil Court based on plaintiff's claim on appeal that her constitutional rights were violated because she was unrepresented by counsel in this small claims action (see generally Wills v City of Troy, 258 AD2d 849 [1999]).
We further conclude that the evidence supports the Civil Court's finding that plaintiff failed to meet her burden of proof as to her substantive claims. The issue presented here was one of credibility, which is more properly weighed by the trier of fact.
The trial court found plaintiff to be incredible and thus discredited her testimony. The court openly questioned plaintiff's convenient failure to bring necessary documents she claimed existed which supported her alleged entitlement to a certain number of days, noted plaintiff's contradictory testimony, and, when presented with conflicting testimony, made a credibility finding in favor of defendant and concluded that plaintiff had failed to meet her burden of proof.
"On a bench trial, the decision of the fact-finding court should not be disturbed upon appeal unless it is obvious that the court's conclusions could not be reached under any fair interpretation of the evidence, especially when the findings of fact rest in large measure on considerations relating to the credibility of witnesses. This standard applies with greater force to judgments rendered in the Small Claims Part, which is commanded to do substantial justice between the parties according to the rules of substantive law (CCA 1804)" (Williams v Roper, 269 AD2d 125, 126 [2000] [citation and internal quotation marks omitted]).

"Because there is ample support in the record, there is no basis to disturb the factual findings made by Civil Court (cf., Rollock v Gerald Modell Inc., 169 Misc 2d 663, 665 [small claims judgment must rest upon competent evidence])" (Williams, 269 AD2d
at 127). Substantial justice has been done here (see CCA 1804, 1807), and, thus, there is no basis for upsetting the Civil Court's determination.

Accordingly, the judgment is affirmed.

Weston, J.P., Golia and Rios, JJ., concur.
Decision Date: May 22, 2009