Facts
- Jose Rosa, a Passaic police officer, responded on duty to a call for emergency medical assistance at a Dunkin’ Donuts regarding an unconscious employee.
- While helping move the unconscious employee on a stretcher through the kitchen toward a police ambulance, Rosa slipped on a powdery white substance on the kitchen floor and was injured.
- Rosa alleged the franchise and its owner negligently allowed the substance to remain on the floor, creating a slippery condition.
- Rosa pursued workers’ compensation and also filed a negligence action against the franchise and its owner.
- The trial court granted summary judgment to defendants based on the fireman’s rule as applied to police officers; the Appellate Division affirmed.
Issues
- Whether the fireman’s rule bars a police officer’s negligence claim against a property owner for an unsafe condition encountered while responding to an emergency, even when the owner’s negligence did not cause the emergency that brought the officer to the premises.
- Whether a slippery-floor hazard in the course of an on-duty emergency response is an “ordinary negligence” risk inherent in police work covered by the fireman’s rule.
Decision
- The Supreme Court of New Jersey affirmed summary judgment for defendants.
- The court held the fireman’s rule bars a police officer’s claim for ordinary negligence arising from risks that are inherent in, and reasonably expected during, performance of duty at the scene.
- The bar applies even if the defendant’s negligence did not create the event that prompted the officer’s presence.
Legal Principles
- Under New Jersey’s fireman’s rule (as applied to police officers), a property owner is not liable in negligence to a paid public-safety officer for injuries caused by ordinary negligent conditions that are among the normal hazards of responding to emergencies.
- The rule is not limited to negligence that created the initial emergency; it also covers ordinary negligent conditions encountered during the response that officers should anticipate as part of their work.
- The rule reflects a policy allocation of loss for routine job-related risks to public compensation systems (including salary and workers’ compensation), rather than tort recovery from individual property owners.
Conclusion
Because a slippery kitchen floor was a foreseeable, job-related hazard encountered while Rosa performed core emergency-response duties, the fireman’s rule barred his ordinary-negligence claim against the franchise and its owner, and dismissal on summary judgment was affirmed.