Tag: death

New Jersey Court Answers The Burning Question: Can I Sue The Owner Of An Abandoned Church If I Slip And Fall On The Sidewalk Outside The Church?

by: Peter J. Gallagher (@pjsgallagher) (LinkedIn)

Slip and fall (pd)
The facts and legal issues in sidewalk slip and fall cases sometimes read like they are pulled from law school final exams. In New Jersey, the baseline legal rule is clear — owners of commercial properties generally have a duty to maintain, in reasonably good condition, the sidewalks abutting their property, while owners of residential properties do not. But does a property owner have a duty to maintain its sidewalks when:

  • the property is both residential and commercial, like a multi-family home where one unit is owner occupied and the others are rented (click here for more on that, but the short answer is that it depends on whether the property is primarily residential or primarily commercial ); or
  • the plaintiff is a tenant and sues the landlord after slipping on a sidewalk outside the rental property (click here for more on that, but usually, yes); or
  • the property is a commercial property, final judgment of foreclosure has been entered in favor of the lender, but no sheriff's sale has been scheduled (click here for more on that, but if the lender can be considered a mortgagee in possession, then yes); or 
  • the property is owned by a condominium or common-interest community (click here for more, but generally, yes if it's a private sidewalk within the condominium, no if it's a public sidewalk abutting the condominium); or
  • the property is residential and the fall is caused by sweetgum spikey seed pods that fell from a tree on the defendant's property (click here, but, no).

And now one more can be added to the list thanks to the Appellate Division's decision is Ellis v. Hilton United Methodist Church, where the question presented was whether "sidewalk liability applies to an owner of a vacant church."

Continue reading “New Jersey Court Answers The Burning Question: Can I Sue The Owner Of An Abandoned Church If I Slip And Fall On The Sidewalk Outside The Church?” →

Shortcut Across Bank Parking Lot Leads To A Slip And Fall, But No Liability For The Bank

 by:  Peter J. Gallagher (@pjsgallagher) (LinkedIn)

SlipandfallI tagged this post in the "banking" category even though its only connection to banking is that it involves a slip-and-fall that occurred in a bank parking lot. But, it offers yet another example of something I have written about before — liability of property owners for accidents that occur on their property.

In Negron v. Warriner's Construction Co., plaintiff slipped on ice and snow in a PNC Bank parking lot that he was using as a short cut to get from his home to a nearby Dollar Store. A morning snow storm dropped approximately 5-6 inches of snow on the area. After the snow stopped, the parking lot was plowed and salted. Plaintiff, who lives across the street from the bank, actually watched the lot get plowed and salted. Several hours after the lot was plowed, a light snowfall covered the lot again with a dusting of snow and, in certain spots, ice underneath.

At around 9 pm, after the second snowfall, plaintiff left his home for the Dollar Store. "Rather than staying on public sidewalks, plaintiff took his normal route by taking a shortcut across the PNC Bank parking lot." This was apparently not uncommon in the neighborhood; residents regularly cut across the lot. There were no fences or gates preventing them from doing so, but there was a "No Trespassing" sign. There was also a sign restricting parking to only bank customers, but this was frequently ignored by neighborhood residents who parked their cars in the lot. 

Continue reading “Shortcut Across Bank Parking Lot Leads To A Slip And Fall, But No Liability For The Bank” →

On a warm summer’s evenin’, on a train bound for nowhere . . . is a dispute over insuring a stranger’s life

 by:  Peter J. Gallagher (@pjsgallagher) (LinkedIn)

Gambling

I know it is a little obvious, but I couldn't write a post about gambling without using lyrics from "The Gambler." Fortunately, the case this post discusses — Sun Life Assurance Co. of Canada v. U.S. Bank National Association — is anything but obvious. Sun Life involved gambling on another person's life but not in a Deer Hunter, Russian roulette kind of way. In Sun Life, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit addressed the enforceability of an insurance policy that insured a stranger's life.

In Sun Life, Judge Posner began his decision by discussing the common law principle that "forbids a person to own an insurance policy that insures someone else's life unless the policy owner has an insurable interest in that life." A wife can have an insurable interest in her husband's or children's lives, a creditor can have an insurable interest in a debtor's life, but "you cannot own an insurance policy on the life of a stranger who you happen to know is in poor health and likely to die soon." The reason is that, by doing so, you are essentially gambling on another person's life, and gambling contracts are generally unenforceable as a matter of public policy. 

Continue reading “On a warm summer’s evenin’, on a train bound for nowhere . . . is a dispute over insuring a stranger’s life” →

Unless You Have Won The Lottery You Don’t Need To Read This Post

by: Peter J. Gallagher (@pjsgallagher)

The Appellate Division handed down a decision today that will never have any impact on my life. The case — In re. Petition of BofI Federal Bank to Assign Lottery Prize Payment Rights — was a consolidated appeal of four Law Division cases that denied BofI Federal Bank's request to assign certain lottery payments from four separate prize winners.

The appeal involved four winners of the Win for Life scratch off game. (As an aside, I have loyally played this game for years in both New York and New Jersey and never even come close to winning, unless scratching off two "LIFE" symbols seemingly every time means I am getting close.) Under the rules of the game, winners receive a guaranteed prize of $1 million payable in quarterly installments for 18 years and then quarterly payments for the rest of the winner's lifetime. For reasons not disclosed in the opinion, BofI (Bank of the Internet if you are curious) filed petitions seeking approval of the assignment of the last two years of the guaranteed quarterly payments.

 

Continue reading “Unless You Have Won The Lottery You Don’t Need To Read This Post” →

More Stories On Wellington’s Millions

by:  Peter J. Gallagher

Last week, we featured a post about the estate of grumpy Saginaw, Michigan lumber baron Wellington Burt ("Worth The Wait? Midwest Lumber Baron's Fortune Passes To Heirs 90 Years After His Death").  You might recall that Burt decreed, in his hand written will, that none of his heirs would receive a cent of his $90 million fortune (calculated in 1919 at the time of his death) until 21 years after the death of his last then-living  grandchild.  Since then there have been a number of stories about this colorful character and his estate.  The Today show featured it in a short piece that aired at the end of last week ("After 92 Years, Millionaire Miser's Heirs Finally Split $100M") and the Saginaw News has a number of stories that provide even more detail into both the man ("92 Years After His Death, Saginaw Lumber Baron's Vindictive Testament Nears Endgame"), and the tortured history of his estate ("Great-great-great Granddaughter Calls Saginaw Lumber Legacy A 'Curse" On Family") and its administration ("Saginaw Judge Carries Out Century-Old Wishes Of Unusual Lumber Tycoon").