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Grubbs v. Knoll4/15/2005
olls rely primarily upon Blazovic v. Andrich, 124 N.J. 90 (1991), to bolster their argument for joint and several liability.
In Blazovic, supra, 124 N.J. at 93-94, the cause of action arose out of an altercation in the parking lot of a restaurant. The injured plaintiff instituted suit against the individuals who struck him, asserting claims for intentional torts, and the restaurant, based on a theory of negligence in providing inadequate lighting and security. Id. at 94. The individual defendants settled with the plaintiff prior to trial. Ibid. At trial, the jury found the restaurant was negligent, the plaintiff was comparatively negligent, and the individual settling defendants were responsible for committing an intentional assault and battery against plaintiff. Ibid.
The issue addressed by the Supreme Court was whether the Comparative Negligence Act required the jury to apportion fault among the plaintiff, the negligent defendant restaurant, and the settling defendants whose fault was based on intentional conduct. Id. at 92-93. After a review of the legislative intent and case law interpreting the Comparative Negligence Act, the Court ultimately held that "responsibility for a plaintiff's claimed injury is to be apportioned according to each party's relative degree of fault, including the fault attributable to an intentional tortfeasor." Id. at 107.
In reaching this decision, the Court considered and rejected an argument, also advanced by the Knolls here, that apportionment of fault between a negligent defendant (here, Chapman) and intentional tortfeasors (here, Stevens and the Grubbs) could disadvantage a plaintiff "if fault were substantially allocated to intentional wrongdoers who were not financially able to satisfy the judgment." Id. at 110. The Blazovic Court rejected that position because it "ignores the principle that the parties causing an injury should be liable in proportion to their relative fault." Ibid.
The Court in Blazovic considered whether an apportionment of fault between the intentional tortfeasors and the negligent restaurant would dilute the restaurant's duty to prevent altercations in its parking lot, under the rationale of cases precluding defendants from relying upon a plaintiff's comparative negligence in instances where the defendant's duty included the obligation to prevent the plaintiff's self-injurious conduct. Id. at 111. After citing that line of cases, the Court "recognize that the reasoning underlying those decisions could appropriately be applied to preclude apportionment of fault between two tortfeasors when the duty of one encompassed the obligation to prevent the specific misconduct of the other." Ibid. (emphasis added). Despite that recognition, however, the Court declined to apply that principle to the restaurant in the case before it:
Based on the record before us, it would be highly speculative to conclude that the causal connection between [the restaurant's] alleged negligence and the combined misconduct of plaintiff and the individual defendants was sufficient to invoke the rationale of Cowan, Suter, and Soronen. Our view is that the events that allegedly took place in the parking lot neither were sufficiently foreseeable nor bore an adequate causal relationship to [the restaurant's] alleged fault to justify the imposition on [the restaurant] of the entire responsibility for the resultant injury. In this case we adhere to the general principle that liability should be imposed in proportion to fault.
[Blazovic, supra, 124 N.J. at 112.]
Following Blazovic, courts have continued to apportion fault between intentional tortfeasors and defendants found liable for negligence despite claim
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