Court Opinion

ID: 9764609
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:32:35.223433+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:58.683706
License: Public Domain

CLIFFOED, J.,
dissenting.
The result in this case turns on the meaning of N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1. That statute bars a late “action * * * to recover damages for any deficiencies in the design * * * of an improvement to real property * * * arising out of the defective and unsafe condition of” that improvement. The issue before us is whether the presence of an “unsafe condition” should be deter*368mined by reference to the defect’s anticipated effect on a project as planned, as defendants claim, or from its present capacity for producing injury, as plaintiff argues.
The language of the statute, quoted above, is not so plain as to yield the answer. To determine the legislative intent, therefore, we must look beyond the words of the enactment to statements of policy, concepts of reasonableness, and legislative history. See Shapiro v. Essex County Bd. of Chosen Freeholders, 177 N.J.Super. 87, 93, 424 A.2d 1203 (Law Div.1980), aff'd, 183 N.J.Super. 24, 443 A.2d 219 (App.Div.), aff'd, 91 N.J. 430, 453 A.2d 158 (1982).
The language of N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1 is derived in large part from a model statute endorsed by design- and construction-trade organizations. E.A. Williams, Inc. v. Russo Dev. Corp., 82 N.J. 160, 164-65, 411 A.2d 697 (1980). (See Comment, Limitation of Action Statutes for Architects and Builders— Blueprint for Non-action, 18 Cath.U.L.Rev. 361, 365 n. 31 (1969), for the text of the model statute!) The model statute is not limited to claims “arising out of the defective and unsafe condition” of the improvement; rather, its wording suggests that it furnishes protection from liability for any claim based on a design defect. E.A. Williams, Inc., supra, 82 N.J. at 169, 411 A.2d 697. Because our Legislature chose to add the “defective and unsafe” limiting clause, this Court has interpreted our statute to require “not only * * * that damages arise from deficiencies in design, plan, supervision, or construction of the improvement, but also that those deficiencies be related to a resulting condition [that] is itself ‘defective and unsafe.’ ” Ibid, (emphasis added).
The legislative history of N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1, described by Justice Mountain as “meager and unrevealing,” provides no insight into the intent of the lawmakers. See Rosenberg v. Town of North Bergen, 61 N.J. 190, 194, 293 A.2d 662 (1972). However, given the anxiety over the courts’ expansion of architects’ and builders’ liability, see ante at 362-363, 590 A.2d *369at 1173-1174, “it appears that [the statute’s] major impetus was to limit liability of designers, planners, and builders for damages from injury to person and property, consequences that ordinarily flow from unsafe conditions.” E.A. Williams, Inc., supra, 82 N.J. at 171, 411 A.2d 697. “The statute was meant to preclude the liability of those whose work created a situation hazardous to the well-being and safety of persons or property coming into contact with the improvement or structure.” Ibid.
In light of this Court’s perception that the purpose of the statute was to rein in judicially-expanded liability in tort, the addition of the “defective and unsafe” limiting clause to the language of the model statute demonstrates that the Legislature was willing to go only so far in protecting the interests of design and construction professionals. As noted above, the model statute proposed that after a certain number of years those groups be afforded complete protection from any liability based on a design defect. By adding the limiting clause to the statute, however, the Legislature chose not to provide protection from any liability except for that related to personal-injury and property-damage loss.
Exposure to liability of that sort obtains only when the defective condition is currently capable of inflicting injury. Liability for personal injury and property damage does not arise while the danger that the design defect poses is only abstract — and the only “danger” that is present when defendants’ error is viewed in the context of the ten-story building called for in the hospital’s Master Plan is an abstract or potential one at best. I believe that for a defective condition to be deemed “unsafe” for purposes of the statute of repose, the Legislature intended that the condition currently be capable of causing injury. Interpreting N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1 as does the majority expands the statute’s application to the sort of liability the Legislature specifically refused to include, as evinced by its failure to adopt the broader coverage of the model statute.
*370The Court has considered previously other factors frequently advanced in support of statutes of repose such as the one before us:
1. Potential liability throughout professional life, vulnerability to tenuous claims, defense expense, and onerous record keeping reflect the need for some limitation of liability.
2. Passage of time severely handicaps the defense of an action. Even aside from the obstacles of faded memories, unavailable witnesses and lost evidence, problems of proof are extremely complex not only because of the joint effort involved in initial construction, but also due to any inadequate maintenance, improper use, or improvements and services that may follow. The architect and builder have no control over the owner, whose negligence may be the real cause of dangerous conditions.
3. The injured party retains his remedy against the owners after the statutory period. With the passage of time, the probability increases that improper maintenance, rather than faulty design or construction, is the proximate cause of injury. Thus, some reasonable time limitation for suit is a fair compromise, and statistical data show that 84.3 percent of all claims against architects and builders would be brought within four years. [O’Connor v. Altus, 67 N.J. 106, 121, 335 A.2d 545 (1975) (quoting Comment, supra, 18 Cath. U.L.Rev. at 384).]
None of those concerns is implicated when N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1 is interpreted to apply only when the design defect creates a tangibly-unsafe condition. Concerning the first factor, because no danger yet exists, there is no potential for injury, and with no potential for injury, there is no danger of unlimited liability. Only when the defective condition is directly capable of causing harm is there potential for such liability. The Legislature’s determination that claims “arising out of the defective and unsafe condition of an improvement to real property,” ibid., are barred if not instituted within ten years of construction can be understood to encompass only conditions that had the capacity to cause injury. The potentially-unsafe condition in this case would have acquired that capacity only after the hospital had undertaken construction of the building’s final phase. It makes little sense to impute to the Legislature an intent to require such a claim to be filed during a period when the potentially-defective condition was dormant, incapable of causing harm.
The thought behind the second point is that the architect has no control over an owner whose neglect or misuse, as time *371passes, is more likely to be the actual cause of the hazard than is a design defect. That circumstance is not a concern when the form of the building in which the defect is capable of causing injury, not having been built, cannot be subjected to owner abuse.
The third factor combines the likelihood of owner neglect with the owner’s continued susceptibility to liability to an injured party. That concern is not material here: there is no third-party “injured” entity, and the owner has only these defendants to whom it may turn to recoup its expenses.
To interpret the statute to require that for a defective condition to be “unsafe,” the flaw must present a palpable, existing, present, real-honest-to-goodness danger is simply more reasonable. Especially is that so in view of the facts of this case. Defendants’ duty was to design the base structure of a multiple-phase building. The suit against them is for a deficiency in that design. The mistake they made did not affect the safety of their project. Considering the yet-to-be-completed status of the building, the majority’s analysis rests on hypothetical liability that would have arisen had the building been completed without the necessary reinforcement. Common sense suggests that the statute is directed toward how the allegedly defective condition now affects the phases of the building already in place, not how it would affect some make-believe not-yet-completed structure.
Finally, the majority claims that defendants’ work “involved ‘a situation hazardous to the well-being and safety of persons or property coming into contact with the improvement or structure,’ ” and that the planned expansion “will be ‘property coming into contact with the improvement’ ” addressed by the statute. Ante at 366-367, 590 A.2d at 1175-1176 (quoting E.A. Williams, Inc., supra, 82 N.J. at 170, 411 A.2d 697). That would be the case had the structure been built so that its inadequacies presented a danger to persons or property. In that situation the design defect’s potential for causing personal *372injury or property damage would be real. However, because the defect, at the time it was corrected, did not endanger the structure itself, other property, or persons, plaintiffs claim seeking to recoup repair expenses cannot be deemed to be of the sort “arising from a defective and unsafe condition.” The performance of remedial work indicates a defective condition; it does not necessarily point to the presence of a hazard. Here, an unsafe condition simply did not exist: if the hospital had foregone its planned expansion, no remedial effort would have been necessary because nothing and no one was threatened.
The majority opinion sets the stage for potentially erratic evaluations of less-than-cosmic propositions, i.e., whether a defect is an “unsafe condition” rather than a “functional impairment.” Some lawyers and judges may enjoy the indoor sport of picking apart a problem of that sort, but I would avoid such a contest by reading N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1 to be triggered on completion of services but not to apply until the defect becomes capable of producing injury. Thus, if the injury-producing capability is realized at any time after ten years from the performance of services, the statute will have been triggered and will be applicable.
In sum, N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.1 offers repose ten years after services are performed for claims alleging design defects “arising out of the defective and unsafe condition of an improvement to real property.” In adopting that language the Legislature rejected an interpretation of the statute that would expand its coverage to liability that is not related to personal injury or property damage. For purposes of applying N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1.-1, therefore, a defective condition should be considered unsafe only when it presents the possibility of creating liability of that sort. For it to do so, the defective condition must be directly capable of producing injury.
I would affirm.
For reversal and reinstatement — Chief Justice WILENTZ, and Justices HANDLER, POLLOCK, O’HERN and GARIBALDI — 5.
For affirmance — Justices CLIFFORD and STEIN — 2.