Did Lead Paint in Apartments Injure Tenant's Child?

Tenant sued landlord NYCHA, claiming that her child was exposed to lead paint in the apartment they lived in. The child was born in 2005, diagnosed as having elevated blood lead levels in 2010, and some of the surfaces DOH tested in each of the two apartments tenant lived in at the building during that time tested positive for lead. Landlord asked the court to dismiss the case without a trial.

The court ruled against landlord. There were conflicting results as to whether there was lead in the concrete ceilings, and NYCHA didn’t demonstrate that it didn’t know about lead paint in the building. A trial was needed to determine the facts. The building super had testified that several tenants reported lead poisoning in their children although he didn’t know what apartment test results had shown. Lead paint violations also had been issued against NYCHA for the building. NYCHA also argued that lead paint was banned in New York City in 1960, and the building wasn’t constructed until 1974. But the ban on lead paint alone wasn’t sufficient to prove that no lead paint was used.

Dakota Jade T. v. NYCHA: 2017 NY Slip Op 01987, 2017 WL 1051924 (App. Div. 1 Dept.; 3/21/17; Richter, JP, Manzanet-Daniels, Gische, Webber, Kahn, JJ)