Tarrytown resort rental company sued for unsafe steps

A Tarrytown company that bills itself as the Hudson Valley’s premier luxury vacation rental service and seeks to leave each guest with “a smile on their face” has been sued for allegedly leaving a guest with serious injuries.

Margaret Clark, of San Diego, accused 5 Trinity Place LLC, an affiliate of Hudson Valley Luxury Resorts, of failure to maintain safe stairs at an Orange County property, in a complaint filed on Oct. 1 in Westchester Supreme Court.

Clark rented 5 Trinity Place, Cornwall, on April 19. The 7 bedroom, 7 bath “mini-estate” is near the United States Military Academy in West Point and is known as West Point Mansion or as the Knoll Shoal farmhouse.

Clark does not say how much she paid, but according to the resorts’ website it was charging $1,062 a night on the day she says she was a guest.

She claims she fell down stairs and was seriously injured. As a result she became lame and disabled, suffered internal injuries, could not engage in her usual occupation and activities for a long time, and will continue to suffer pain from permanent injuries.

Clark says that 5 Trinity Place LLC had a duty to maintain the property in a safe condition. Instead, she alleges, it failed to provide sufficient lighting, handrails on both sides of the stairs, or adequate treads on the steps.

Allowing a hazardous condition to exist, the complaint states, constituted “a concealed menace, nuisance, hazard and trap.”

She is demanding an unspecified but “substantial sum of money.”

The complaint also names Airbnb Inc. online booking service as a defendant. Airbnb spokesperson Elle Wye said the organization does not comment on pending litigation. Hudson Valley Luxury did not reply to a message asking for its side of the story.