Suit Against Concert Hall Ends on Sour Note for Plaintiff (NY)

Plaintiff Jane Baranker was walking into Lincoln Center to see Julliard students perform. Surveillance video showed that a man carrying what appeared to be an instrument on his back walked rapidly toward her, knocked her down, and kept walking. Plaintiff testified at deposition, before walking away, the man said, “I’m on in 5 minutes.” She further testified the Lincoln Center security guard stated, “This happens all the time.”

Plaintiff allegedly injured her wrist and fractured her knee. In Baranker v. Lincoln Center, et al., she sued Julliard School, Lincoln Center, and the City of New York, claiming defendants failed to supervise and control the crowd, provide a safe means of egress and ingress, provide a separate area for performers to enter the concert hall so as not to injure pedestrians, and to erect barricades or arrange the plaza safely to avoid such collisions.

The case was dismissed as to Julliard because the court found it had no control over the area where the accident occurred, and granted summary judgment in favor of the remaining defendants, Lincoln Center and the City of New York, holding that they had no duty to protect plaintiff from other pedestrians, even if the other pedestrian may have been a performer.

The court emphasized that there was no evidence of a dangerous or defective condition, this was not an issue of crowd control because there was not a crowd where plaintiff fell, the accident was caused by the other pedestrian’s negligence rather than anything done by Lincoln Center or the City of New York, and the accident was not reasonably foreseeable. The court also took public policy into account and was reluctant to set precedent that a concert facility would be liable for the negligence of others.

Thanks to Betsy Silverstine for her contribution to this post.  Please write to Mike Bono for more information.