After several delays sought by his attorney, Wednesday was the deadline for Charles Streep’s legal answer to the civil complaint regarding his alleged assault on David Peralta, a Springs teenager who required emergency brain surgery following what was called a “road rage” altercation with Mr. Streep in East Hampton Village’s Chase Bank parking lot over the summer.
Mr. Streep, 31, is the actress Meryl Streep’s nephew. He lives in SoHo, and his family has a house on Pondview Lane here.
Instead of filing an answer, Mr. Streep’s attorney, Randy Mastro, the personal attorney to Rudy Giuliani, filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit minutes before midnight on Wednesday.
Mr. Mastro wrote in the 16-page motion that “a viable negligence claim would require Streep to have owed a duty to Peralta, but of course, he owed none.” Mr. Mastro argued that accusations of his client having thrown Mr. Peralta to the ground were “way too vague” and that Mr. Peralta was “not placed in imminent apprehension of harm.”
Mr. Streep also claimed in the motion that the complaint had not given him “sufficient notice to the occurrence.” Mr. Streep was arrested by East Hampton Town police three days following the incident, and his attorney sought extensions to file a formal answer.
The motion aims to dismiss claims of assault, battery, criminal liability, punitive damages, negligence, gross negligence, and recklessness filed by Mr. Peralta, whose medical bills have approached $100,000.
“I have no idea what they’re talking about,” said Edmond Chakmakian, lawyer to the 18-year-old, who instead of attending college in his sophomore year is undergoing a difficult recovery from an emergency skull cap removal. “This is the most frivolous, empty motion I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s a transparent attempt to delay the inevitable that he’s going to be held liable for his actions.”
Claiming that racial slurs were used “during” the attack, and not beforehand, Mr. Streep’s defense also contests that the complaint “does not share even one of the alleged slurs.”
“The fact that I didn’t add the words has nothing to do with anything,” said Mr. Chakmakian, who claimed that doing so was “very rare” and done in only “an exceedingly heavy case” for the defendant to deflect accusations and not provide a formal answer.
After disputing Mr. Streep’s recent attempts to stay the case, put all exchange of information on hold while his criminal trial is pending, and move the civil case from a New York City court to one in Suffolk County, Mr. Chakmakian said he saw the late-night motion to dismiss as another tactic “that I would describe in three words as: delay, delay, delay.”
