## Facts

- P.V., a New Jersey resident with Down syndrome, attended a summer program run by New Jersey Camp Jaycee, Inc., a New Jersey nonprofit that operated its camp in Pennsylvania.
- In 2003, while at the Pennsylvania camp, P.V. was allegedly sexually assaulted by another camper.
- P.V. and her parents sued Camp Jaycee in New Jersey, alleging negligent supervision at the Pennsylvania camp and resulting personal injuries requiring medical treatment.
- Camp Jaycee invoked the New Jersey Charitable Immunity Act (CIA), which generally immunizes qualifying charities from negligence claims by beneficiaries.

## Issues

1. Whether New Jersey’s Charitable Immunity Act bars a negligence action filed in New Jersey against a New Jersey charity for tortious conduct and injury occurring at its Pennsylvania camp.
2. Under New Jersey’s choice-of-law rules for personal injury, whether New Jersey or Pennsylvania has the most significant relationship to the occurrence and parties, given Pennsylvania’s abrogation of charitable immunity.

## Decision

- The New Jersey Supreme Court affirmed the Appellate Division’s reversal of summary judgment and remanded for further proceedings.
- The court held that Pennsylvania law governs the negligence claim.
- Because Pennsylvania has abrogated charitable immunity, Camp Jaycee was not immune from suit on the basis of New Jersey’s CIA for the Pennsylvania-occurring injury.
- A dissent would have applied New Jersey law based on New Jersey’s policy favoring charitable immunity for New Jersey nonprofits.

## Legal Principles

- In New Jersey personal-injury conflicts cases, the governing approach is the Restatement (Second) of Conflict of Laws “most significant relationship” test.
- Restatement § 146 creates a presumption that the law of the state where the injury occurred applies, unless another state has a more significant relationship to the parties or issues.
- The § 146 presumption is evaluated using the § 145 contacts (place of injury, place of conduct, parties’ domiciles/incorporation, and where the relationship is centered) and the § 6 policy factors.
- A forum’s charitable immunity statute is treated as substantive for choice-of-law purposes; its application depends on the state law selected by the conflicts analysis, not merely on forum filing.
- A state where the defendant’s operations occur and where the injury and conduct are located has a strong regulatory interest in governing safety-related tort liability within its borders.

## Conclusion

The court applied the Restatement’s presumptive place-of-injury rule and concluded Pennsylvania had the most significant relationship to the alleged negligent supervision and resulting injury at the Pennsylvania camp, so Pennsylvania law applied and New Jersey’s charitable immunity did not bar the suit.


P.V. ex rel. T.V. v. Camp Jaycee, 197 N.J. 132, 962 A.2d 453 (N.J. 2008)