Opinion
December 4, 1995
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Queens County (Rutledge, J.).
Ordered that the order is reversed insofar as appealed from, with costs, and that branch of the defendants' motion which was for a protective order suppressing the transcripts of the audiotape of the defendants' depositions prepared by the plaintiffs' counsel is granted in its entirety.
On May 25, 1994, depositions of all parties were held. Those depositions were audiotaped and stenographically recorded by a reporter. At the direction of the plaintiffs' counsel, the audiotape was later transcribed and certified by a notary public who was not present at the depositions. That branch of the defendants' motion which was to suppress the transcripts of the audiotape prepared by the plaintiffs' counsel was purportedly granted in the order appealed from, but only to the extent that the "defendants are not required to execute the transcripts". We find that those transcripts cannot be used because they were not properly certified (see, CPLR 3116 [b]; 22 NYCRR 202.15 [f]; Velasquez v Columbia Presbyt. Med. Ctr., 137 Misc.2d 733, 736). Accordingly, that branch of the defendants' motion which was for a protective order suppressing the transcripts of the audiotape of the defendants' depositions prepared by the plaintiffs' counsel is granted in its entirety. Bracken, J.P., O'Brien, Ritter, Friedmann and Goldstein, JJ., concur.