Plaintiff Alejandra Padilla slipped and fell on the sidewalk adjoining a vacant lot in Camden, which was owned by the defendants Myo Soon and Young Il an. She claimed to have suffered permanent injuries as a result of her fall. The issue in Padilla v. Young Il an, 2023 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 14 (App. Div. Jan. 4, 2023), was whether the defendants, as owners of the vacant lot, abutting the public sidewalk, owed a duty to the plaintiff to safely maintain that sidewalk.
At the trial court level, the defendants filed for a summary judgment dismissal on the basis that they did not owe a duty to plaintiff. The trial court judge agreed, based upon prior precedent, that “they had no duty to maintain the sidewalk because it abutted a vacant lot which was not generating any income.” The trial court judge rejected the plaintiff’s argument that defendants could have generated income by either developing or selling the property. While the trial court judge acknowledged that the prior Supreme Court case of Stewart v. 104 Wallace St., held that the owner of a commercial property had a duty to the plaintiff to safely maintain an abutting sidewalk, the subsequent Appellate Division decision of Abraham v. Gupta found that duty did not apply where the property could not generate income to purchase liability insurance.
Upon appeal, the plaintiff renewed her argument that Stewart should apply because the property was capable of generating income by operation of a commercial activity on it and defendants bought and sold the property for a commercial profit. Further, plaintiff noted that there was a municipal ordinance that required that the sidewalks in the City “shall be kept in repair by the owner or owners of the abutting property at the cost and expense of the owner or owners of the lands in front of which any such sidewalk is constructed.”
Upon appeal, the Appellate Division rejected the argument that the ordinance provided any private remedy to persons injured as a result of the breach of the ordinance. It reaffirmed the longstanding precedent regarding the lack of liability for violation of the duty imposed by an ordinance upon abutting property owners to maintain sidewalks. The Appellate Division also agreed with the trial court judge that the Abraham case remained good law that an owner of an non-income producing vacant lot owes no duty to the public to maintain the lot’s abutting sidewalk in a safe condition. Thus, it affirmed the trial court decision, dismissing the lawsuit.