NEW YORK — The family of a Westchester, New York grandmother who died after falling into an open manhole in Midtown Manhattan filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the utility responsible for the manhole, alleging its workers failed to properly seal the cover.
Donike Goncaj, 56, fell into the manhole on May 18 and died of scald burns and thermal inhalation from the steam.
The lawsuit called them “severe, horrifying, and catastrophic injuries.” The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner ruled her death an accident.
The utility, ConEd, concluded a truck ran over the manhole and dislodged the cover.
The lawsuit, filed by Goncaj’s son and domestic partner, alleged Con Edison “should have known that dislodged and displaced manhole covers presented a recurring and foreseeable danger to pedestrians” and accused the utility of negligence, carelessness and reckless disregard for their mother’s safety.
Someone falling to their death in a manhole “ordinarily does not occur in the absence of negligence,” the lawsuit said.
“ConEd, its agents, servants, representatives, employees and contractors had a duty to maintain the Subject Manhole and the Subject Manhole Cover in reasonably safe conditions, to keep the Subject Manhole securely, properly, adequately, appropriately, and safely covered, to inspect and monitor the Subject Manhole and the Subject Manhole Cover, to provide a staircase, ladder or means to egress and exit it, and to guard, barricade, cordon off, block and warn pedestrians, including but not limited to the plaintiff’s decedent, Donike Goncaj,” the lawsuit said.
According to the lawsuit, Goncaj’s domestic partner, Jashar Kameraj, witnessed her falling into the scalding hot manhole and tried to rescue her, to no avail.
Kameraj and Goncaj’s son is seeking unspecified damages.
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