AMENDMENT DIDN’T ESTABLISH “WILLFUL OR WANTON” NEGLIGENCE
After PB’s motion to amend his complaint to add a punitive damages claim was denied by the Richmond County Supreme Court, PB appealed to the Appellate Division, Second Department.
While, typically, motions to amend are “freely given in the absence of prejudice,” the request will be denied when the proposed amendment is “palpably insufficient or patently devoid of merit.”
Because he was unable to provide a sufficient legal basis for the amendment, the AD2 thought that the request had been properly denied. It noted, in part, that PB’s “allegations [were] palpably insufficient to demonstrate that the defendant's conduct evinced a high degree of moral culpability or constituted willful or wanton negligence or recklessness.”
Now how punitive was that?
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DECISION