New York Court of Appeals, 1995

Ward v. Silverberg

New York Court of Appeals · Decided June 7, 1995 · Kaye and Judges Simons, Titone, Bellacosa, Smith, Levine and Ciparick Concur

652 N.E.2d 914; 85 N.Y.2d 993; 629 N.Y.S.2d 168; 1995 N.Y. LEXIS 1107 (North Eastern Reporter, Second Series)

Cases that cite this one

28 later published cases cite this decision. The 25 that cite it most often are listed here.

Smith-Hunter v. Harvey (N.Y. 2000)
Cantalino v. Danner (N.Y. 2001)
O'BRIEN v. Alexander (District Court, S.D. New York 1995)
Washpon v. Parr (District Court, S.D. New York 2008)
Mason v. Town of New Paltz Police Department (District Court, N.D. New York 2000)
Lanning v. City of Glens Falls (2d Cir. 2018)
Laboy v. County of Ontario, N.Y. (2d Cir. 2016)
Laboy v. Ontario County (District Court, W.D. New York 2015)
Bellissimo v. Mitchell (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2014)
Mack v. Town of Wallkill (District Court, S.D. New York 2003)
Cantalino v. Danner (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2000)
Gallagher v. State (N.Y. Ct. Cl. 1997)
O'Brien v. Alexander (2d Cir. 1996)
O'Brien v. Alexander (2d Cir. 1996)
Dicecilia v. Early (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1996)
Sanders v. City of Saratoga Springs (District Court, N.D. New York 2023)
Harmon v. City of Buffalo (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2020)
Lanning v. City of Glens Falls (2d Cir. 2018)
Gill v. City of New York (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2017)
Sinagra v. City of New York (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2015)
Diederich v. Nyack Hospital (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2008)
Plataniotis v. TWE-Advance/ Newhouse Partnership (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2000)
Castelle v. Roter (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 2000)
Vail-Ballou Press, Inc. v. Tomasky (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1999)
Ormandy v. Price Co. (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York 1998)

This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Memorandum.

The order of the Appellate Division should be affirmed, with costs.

To resist defendant’s motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, plaintiff in this malicious prosecution action bears the burden of proving that the underlying criminal action brought against her by her optometrist for the alleged theft of a pair of eyeglasses was terminated in her favor (Martin v City of Albany, 42 NY2d 13, 16). This Court has consistently held that a criminal action is "terminated in the accused’s favor” for purposes of a malicious prosecution claim where a judicial determination of the accused’s innocence on the merits of the action has been made (see, Hollender v Trump Vil. Coop., 58 NY2d 420; Halberstadt v New York Life Ins. Co., 194 NY 1).

Here, the criminal charges were based on plaintiff’s alleged failure to pay her optometrist $25 for additional repairs to a pair of frames she had already paid for. The trial court stated that the criminal charges were dismissed "on consent” after a short colloquy between the court and counsel which culminated in a plea by the defense for a dismissal of the charges "in all fairness to this lady.”

Plaintiff has failed to establish that the dismissal in any way involved a determination on the merits of her guilt or innocence or that the prosecutor lacked a reasonable foundation for the charges. Additionally, the court’s statement to plaintiff that she could be sued civilly for the cost of the repairs cannot be equated with a determination that she was innocent of any coexistent criminal charges. Rather, what is evident from the record is that the interests of justice were best served by a dismissal of the criminal prosecution — a termination of the proceeding which is insufficient to sustain a malicious prosecution action. Accordingly, because the question of guilt or innocence remained unanswered here (Ryan v New York Tel. Co., 62 NY2d 494, 504-505), the motion for summary judgment dismissing the malicious prosecution action was properly granted.

Chief Judge Kaye and Judges Simons, Titone, Bellacosa, Smith, Levine and Ciparick concur.

*995 Order affirmed, with costs, in a memorandum.

Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.