LEONIDES STERGIOS VS. NEW JERSEY TRANSIT CORP.(L-5478-13, BERGEN COUNTY AND STATEWIDE)

NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE
APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION
This opinion shall not "constitute precedent or be binding upon any court."
Although it is posted on the internet, this opinion is binding only on the
parties in the case and its use in other cases is limited. R.1:36-3.
SUPERIOR COURT OF NEW JERSEY
APPELLATE DIVISION
DOCKET NO. A-4344-14T3
LEONIDES STERGIOS and
PETER STERGIOS, her husband,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
NEW JERSEY TRANSIT CORP., NEW
JERSEY TRANSIT BUS OPERATIONS, INC.,
and PAUL LOWNEY,
Defendants,
and
HARRINGTON PARK BOROUGH,
Defendant-Respondent.
________________________________________
Submitted June 28, 2016 – Decided September 5, 2017
Before Judges Espinosa and Grall.
On appeal from the Superior Court of New
Jersey, Law Division, Bergen County, Docket
No. L-5478-13.
McCarter & English, LLP, attorneys for
appellants (Edward J. Fanning, Jr., of
counsel and on the brief; Desiree Grace, on
the brief).
Keenan & Doris, LLC, attorneys for
respondent (Ian C. Doris, of counsel;
Bernadette M. Peslak, on the brief).
PER CURIAM
Plaintiff Leonides Stergios was hit by a bus. She and her
husband Peter (collectively plaintiffs) filed a civil action
naming the New Jersey Transit Corp., New Jersey Transit Bus
Operations, Inc. and the driver, Paul Lowney. Invoking the New
Jersey Tort Claims Act (TCA), N.J.S.A. 59:1-1 to 59:12-3,
plaintiffs also sued the Borough of Harrington Park (Borough).
As to the Borough, plaintiffs alleged the dangerous condition of
the Borough's property, as defined in N.J.S.A. 59:4-1 to -3,
contributed to the accident.
Plaintiffs settled their claims against the driver and New
Jersey Transit, and the trial court dismissed them with
prejudice. Plaintiffs appeal a grant of the Borough's motion
for summary judgment, and the Borough does not contend it was
entitled to immunity pursuant to N.J.S.A. 59:4-6. Accordingly,
the question is whether the evidence submitted on the motion,
viewed in the light most favorable to plaintiffs, establishes
the Borough's entitlement to judgment as a matter of law on
plaintiff's claim. R. 4:46-2(c); Bhagat v. Bhagat, 217 N.J. 22,
38 (2014). The trial court was required to apply that standard,
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and this court must apply it on appeal. Steinberg v. Sahara
Sam's Oasis, LLC, 226 N.J. 344, 349 (2016).
The evidence, viewed favorably to plaintiffs, can be
summarized as follows. Shortly before 5:30 p.m. on August 10,
2011, plaintiff Leonides Stergios and the six to eight other
passengers remaining on the commuter bus disembarked at a
sheltered bus stop. The sheltered bus stop is situated in a
park owned by the Borough, which is adjacent to the Garden State
Parkway. Employees of the Borough's Department of Public Works
erected the shelter behind a curb they also installed.
The shelter is at the curb on a one way street and on
Borough property. It is not an official stop. Nevertheless,
the driver regularly drove this route twice a day five days a
week and generally stopped there as a courtesy, as did other
drivers. Travelling in the proper direction, the driver entered
the narrow roadway leading to the stop and stopped with the bus
faced to continue down the street so he could return the bus to
the garage.
There were no sidewalks leading from the shelter to the
nearby parking lot farther down the street where plaintiff had
left her car. She walked in the street beside the curb to get
to her car, because there was a hedgerow sufficiently proximate
to the curb to preclude her walking on the ground beyond the
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curb. The lay-out of the street, its narrow width, the curb and
the proximity of the hedgerow is depicted in photographs
submitted on the motion.
As the driver moved on he did not notice plaintiff, hit her
and drove one wheel over her leg. The seriousness and
permanency of plaintiff's multiple and complex injuries was
undisputed. There was no evidence the Borough made any effort
to deter New Jersey Transit from allowing its drivers to stop at
the shelter erected by its employees.
The TCA defines the cause of action. N.J.S.A. 59:4.2
states the essential elements as follows:
A public entity is liable for injury caused
by a condition of its property if the
plaintiff establishes that the property was
in dangerous condition at the time of the
injury, that the injury was proximately
caused by the dangerous condition, that the
dangerous condition created a reasonably
foreseeable risk of the kind of injury which
was incurred, and that either:
a. a negligent or wrongful act or
omission of an employee of the
public entity within the scope of
his employment created the
dangerous condition; or
b. a public entity had actual or
constructive notice of the
dangerous condition under section
59:4-3 a sufficient time prior to
the injury to have taken measures
to protect against the dangerous
condition.
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Nothing in this section shall be construed
to impose liability upon a public entity for
a dangerous condition of its public property
if the action the entity took to protect
against the condition or the failure to take
such action was not palpably unreasonable.
A "'dangerous condition' is defined in the Act as 'a
condition of property that creates a substantial risk of injury
when such property is used with due care in a manner in which it
is reasonably foreseeable that it will be used.'" Ogborne v.
Mercer Cemetery Corp., 197 N.J. 448, 458 (2009) (emphasis added)
(quoting N.J.S.A. 59:4-1(a)). A "substantial risk" is "one that
is not minor, trivial or insignificant." Kolitch v. Lindedahl,
100 N.J. 485, 493 (1985) (quoting Polyard v. Terry, 160 N.J.
Super. 497, 509 (App. Div. 1978), aff'd o.b., 79 N.J. 547)
(1979)).
Given the location of a parking lot beyond the bus stop, a
jury could reasonably conclude there was a substantial risk that
a commuter returning to a car from the bus stop and having no
other route but the roadway would be struck by a vehicle from
behind. A jury could also reasonably infer the Borough had
actual notice of the relative locations of the shelter stop,
curb and parking lot, the hedgerow and the absence of a
guardrail and sidewalks. Indeed, a reasonable jury could infer
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the Borough exacerbated the risk by erecting this shelter at the
curb.
The Borough argues that even if it had actual or
constructive notice, the evidence would not permit a jury to
find its failure to correct the condition was "palpably
unreasonable." N.J.S.A. 59:4.2. Conduct is palpably
unreasonable when "it [would] be manifest and obvious that no
prudent person would approve of [the public entity's] course of
action or inaction." Kolitch, supra, 100 N.J. at 485 (quoting
Polyard v. Terry, 148 N.J. Super. 202, 216 (Law Div. 1977),
rev'd on other grounds, 160 N.J. Super. 497 (App. Div. 1978),
aff'd o.b., 79 N.J. 547 (1979)). In this case, a jury could
find that no prudent person would approve of the Borough's
inaction despite multiple options for diminishing the risk
enhanced by the shelter's location. The apparent options
include installation of sidewalks or guardrails, removal of
hedges to provide a pathway other than the narrow roadway,
removal of the shelter it erected or erecting a sign barring bus
drivers' and commuters' use of the shelter at the curb as a
courtesy bus stop.
Focusing on plaintiff's and the bus driver's patently
negligent conduct, the Borough contends that no reasonable jury
could find the condition of its property was a proximate cause
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of this accident. But it is well-settled that "[w]ith respect
to concurrent proximate causation, a tortfeasor will be held
answerable if its 'negligent conduct was a substantial factor in
bringing about the injuries,' even where there are 'other
intervening causes which were foreseeable or were normal
incidents of the risk created.'" Brown v. United States Stove
Co., 98 N.J. 155, 171 (1984) (quoting Rappaport v. Nichols, 31
N.J. 188, 203 (1959)). A reasonable jury applying that measure
on this evidence could find in plaintiff's favor.
For all of the foregoing reasons, we conclude summary
judgment was improvidently granted, vacate the judgment in the
Borough's favor and remand for further proceedings.
Reversed and remanded for further proceedings. We do not
retain jurisdiction.
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