Opinion
April 26, 1993
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Nassau County (Becker, J.).
Ordered that the order is affirmed, with one bill of costs to the respondents appearing separately and filing separate briefs.
On April 23, 1988, the plaintiff Dolores Farrell was running in a five-mile charity race organized by the defendant Westbury-Carle Place Rotary Club. The defendants Town of North Hempstead, Village of Westbury, and County of Nassau assisted in providing police protection and in blocking off traffic from the streets which comprised the race course. At approximately 9:30 A.M., the defendant Leopold Lowy, contrary to the instructions given to him by the Village Superintendent of Public Works, drove his car over some traffic cones blocking off Asbury Avenue, turned onto Ellison Avenue, and struck the plaintiff shortly thereafter. The plaintiffs contend that there exist numerous questions of fact as to the negligence of the defendants Village and County which preclude summary judgment in their favor. We disagree.
It is well established that while a defendant remains liable for all normal and foreseeable consequences of his acts, an intervening act will constitute a superseding cause and will serve to relieve the defendant of liability when the act is of such an extraordinary nature or so attenuates the defendant's conduct from the ultimate injury that responsibility for the injury may not be reasonably attributed to the defendant (see, Mack v Altmans Stage Light. Co., 98 A.D.2d 468; see also, Derdiarian v Felix Contr. Corp., 51 N.Y.2d 308). Although the plaintiffs herein sought to establish that the Village and County were negligent in providing for traffic control during the race, it is clear that under the circumstances of this case the supervening act of the defendant Lowy broke any chain of causation (see, Mannion v Lizza Indus., 127 A.D.2d 567; see also, Campbell v State of New York, 158 A.D.2d 499; Rivera v Goldstein, 152 A.D.2d 556; Grandy v Bavaro, 134 A.D.2d 957). Since the plaintiffs failed to produce any evidence that any acts of the Village or County were a proximate cause of the accident, summary judgment dismissing the complaint as against them was properly granted. Sullivan, J.P., Balletta, Lawrence and Eiber, JJ., concur.