Appeal from an order of the Supreme Court (Ellison, J.), entered October 20, 1989 in Tompkins County, which granted petitioner’s application pursuant to General Municipal Law § 50-e (5) for leave to serve a late notice of claim.
This is an application for leave to serve a late notice of claim. Petitioner, a high school student, alleges that she was driving her car on a Sunday morning in January 1989 when she was pulled over by one of respondent’s police officers, David Stanton, for speeding. According to petitioner, Stanton told her to follow him to a remote parking lot where he raped her. Petitioner became pregnant as a result of this alleged incident, left school and gave birth to a child she subsequently gave up for adoption. Paternity tests apparently indicate a 99.9% probability that Stanton was the father. In her moving papers, petitioner submits an affidavit from her psychiatric social worker relating that, following the alleged attack, petitioner suffered from "post traumatic stress disorder” with the accompanying symptoms of denial, depression and anxiety. These symptoms allegedly impaired petitioner’s ability to register complaints about the incident earlier. Supreme Court granted petitioner permission to file a late notice of claim and this appeal by respondent follows.
We affirm. Supreme Court is afforded broad discretion in permitting the service of a late notice of claim and we find no abuse of that discretion in this case (see, Matter of Frazzetta v Rondout Val. Cent. School Dist.,
Here, although respondent points out that petitioner was very imprecise about the exact date of the alleged attack and there was a six-month delay before respondent presumably knew of its occurrence, it is significant to note that the crux of petitioner’s claim against respondent is her allegation that respondent negligently hired Stanton under circumstances in which it knew or reasonably should have known that Stanton was prone to commit such acts. Respondent’s knowledge as to Stanton’s alleged proclivities is a matter within respondent’s control. Accordingly, it does not appear that respondent would be unduly prejudiced by petitioner’s action. Moreover, in light of the evidence that petitioner was all but incapacitated during the relevant time due to posttraumatic stress disorder as a result of the alleged rape (see, People v Taylor,
Order affirmed, with costs. Mahoney, P. J., Casey, Levine, Mercure and Harvey, JJ., concur.
