In an insurance coverage action regarding an insurer’s duty to defend or indemnify defendant property owners in an underlying personal injury suit, the New York County Supreme Court determined that the suit was excluded from coverage and entered default judgment in favor of the insurer. Defendants, although properly served by the insurer, failed to enter appearances, so the insurer brought a motion pursuant to CPLR 3215 for default judgment and presented competent evidence that it had no duty under the facts of the case and language of the policy to defend or indemnify the defendants because the property where the
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Monthly Archives March 2023
Injured Plaintiff’s Case Doomed by Failure To Provide Evidence that Business Owner Had Actual or Constructive Notice of Dangerous Condition
In Sharif v. Dominant Domain, the NJ Appellate Division upheld the trial court’s grant of summary judgment to a business owner who was sued by a plaintiff injured in a slip and fall. Finding that plaintiff failed to offer competent evidence to demonstrate actual or constructive notice of a dangerous condition, the Court held that there was no genuine issue of material fact regarding notice of any hazard prior to plaintiff’s fall. In her deposition, plaintiff testified that she slipped and fell on ice while descending exterior stairs at the rear entrance of defendant’s commercial building. She had not seen
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NJ Appeals Court Holds that Only Drivers Convicted of DWI are Barred from Filing Suit for Loss Under Statute
In Castano v. Augustine, the New Jersey Appellate Division faced the legal question of whether a statute precluding intoxicated motor vehicle drivers from filing negligence actions applied to a situation where an allegedly intoxicated driver was neither charged with nor pleaded guilty to Driving While Intoxicated (‘DWI”). The statute, N.J.S.A.39:6A-4.5(b), states as follows: “Any person who is convicted of, or pleads guilty to, operating a motor vehicle in violation of [N.J.S.A.] 39:4-50, [N.J.S.A. 39:4-50.4a],[1] or a similar statute from any other jurisdiction, in connection with an accident, shall have no cause of action for recovery of economic or noneconomic loss
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