## Facts

- Clifford A. Eger, a New Jersey resident, worked for Allstates Design and Development Co., Inc. (a New Jersey corporation) as a draftsman from 1964 to 1983.
- Du Pont retained Allstates as a subcontractor to provide design, drafting, and model-building services connected to Du Pont’s operations at the Savannah River Nuclear Plant in South Carolina.
- During his employment, Eger periodically traveled from New Jersey to the South Carolina facility to perform work related to engineering specifications provided by Du Pont.
- The Egers alleged that Eger was exposed to harmful radiation at the plant, causing acute myeloblastic leukemia.
- Eger filed a New Jersey workers’ compensation claim against Allstates in March 1983.
- In April 1984, Eger and his wife filed a New Jersey tort action against Du Pont and others for negligence-related damages arising from the leukemia; claims against Allstates and certain other defendants were later dismissed without prejudice, leaving Du Pont as the relevant defendant on appeal.
- Du Pont moved for summary judgment, asserting immunity as Eger’s “statutory employer” under South Carolina workers’ compensation law; the Law Division granted the motion, and the Appellate Division affirmed.

## Issues

1. Whether New Jersey choice-of-law principles require application of South Carolina workers’ compensation law to determine Du Pont’s tort liability for an injury alleged to have occurred at a South Carolina worksite.
2. Whether, under South Carolina law, Du Pont qualifies as a “statutory employer” of Allstates’ employee, making workers’ compensation the exclusive remedy and barring a New Jersey tort suit.
3. Whether New Jersey public policy permits applying South Carolina’s statutory-employer immunity in a New Jersey forum despite differences between the states’ compensation schemes.

## Decision

- The New Jersey Supreme Court affirmed summary judgment for Du Pont.
- The court held South Carolina law governed Du Pont’s substantive liability because the alleged injury-producing activity occurred at a South Carolina workplace and South Carolina had the dominant governmental interest in regulating work-injury remedies and immunities there.
- Applying South Carolina law, the court concluded Du Pont was Eger’s statutory employer because the subcontracted drafting and design work was part of Du Pont’s “trade, business, or occupation” at the Savannah River project.
- The court enforced South Carolina’s exclusive-remedy and statutory-employer provisions in New Jersey and rejected the argument that New Jersey policy required preserving the tort claim.

## Legal Principles

- In a multistate work-injury dispute, the law of the state with the dominant interest—commonly the state where the injury-producing conduct and workplace are located—governs the effect of workers’ compensation law on tort liability.
- Under South Carolina workers’ compensation law, an owner or contractor may be a “statutory employer” of a subcontractor’s employees when the subcontracted work is part of the owner/contractor’s “trade, business, or occupation”; statutory-employer status provides tort immunity in exchange for compensation responsibility.
- New Jersey courts will apply another state’s workers’ compensation exclusivity and statutory-employer immunity as a matter of choice of law and comity when that state has the stronger regulatory interest and application does not fundamentally conflict with New Jersey public policy.
- New Jersey precedent permitting tort suits against general contractors under New Jersey compensation law does not control when another state’s compensation scheme governs the parties’ substantive rights and immunities for an out-of-state work injury.

## Conclusion

The court held that South Carolina workers’ compensation law governed a New Jersey resident’s alleged radiation injury at a South Carolina facility and that Du Pont, as a statutory employer under South Carolina law, was immune from common-law tort liability in the New Jersey action.


Eger v. E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 110 N.J. 133, 539 A.2d 1213 (N.J. 1988)