Supreme Court Weighs Lawsuit Against New Jersey Transit

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court addressed whether New Jersey Transit can face lawsuits in district court from residents of New York and Pennsylvania for injuries caused by its vehicles.

This technical case involves the question of whether New Jersey Transit qualifies as a government agency that enjoys “sovereign immunity.” This legal principle, rooted in the Eleventh Amendment, protects states from being sued by nonresidents without their consent for services they provide.

During the oral arguments, the usual ideological divides among the justices appeared to lessen, with both liberal and conservative members probing the intricacies of New Jersey’s transportation structure.

“It seems like you’re suggesting that the state’s choice of a corporate structure shouldn’t matter as long as we know its functions,” liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson pointed out to acting state Attorney General Michael Zuckerman. “But they could have created this as a government entity, right?”

Jackson elaborated, saying it appeared that New Jersey opted for a corporate model, which may have implications for its immunity in legal matters.

Established as a state-owned corporation by the New Jersey Legislature in 1979, NJ Transit still requires gubernatorial approval for significant actions like board appointments.

The case discusses two incidents involving NJ Transit buses, one in New York City and the other in Philadelphia, both key locations despite being outside New Jersey.

In 2017, Jeffrey Colt from New York sued the New Jersey Department of Transportation after being injured by a bus in Manhattan, describing the incident as causing a “permanent, life-altering injury.”

The next year, Cedric Garrett filed a lawsuit when a bus struck his vehicle on Market Street in Philadelphia.

In both instances, the New Jersey Department of Transportation sought to have the cases dismissed. New York’s highest court opted to let Colt’s case proceed, while Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court dismissed Garrett’s claims.

Zuckerman contended that “New Jersey Transit isn’t like a city or town and certainly not like a private firm.” He argued that it’s more akin to a state agency, asserting that lawsuits must be filed where the state allows, which is New Jersey.

On the other hand, Attorney Michael Kimberly, representing both Colt and Garrett, argued that New Jersey was attempting to shield its Department of Transportation from the complications of being classified as either a state agency or a corporation.

Kimberly pointed out that independent corporations in New Jersey aren’t subject to constitutional public debt limits, enabling easier debt accumulation.

He emphasized that managing public resources is often simpler when freed from the complexities of state governance. However, he argued that such separate legal structures come with costs, particularly the loss of sovereign immunity.

Kimberly suggested that the New Jersey Department of Transportation uses a “hodgepodge” approach to understand its legal structure, potentially complicating matters.

Lawyers representing New Jersey Transit warned that a ruling against the agency could trigger a flood of lawsuits targeting state entities engaged in various functions.

Kimberly responded by asserting that the consequences would be limited to specific cases where these organizations operate “extraterritorially” and face lawsuits from non-residents.

Decisions in the cases of Consolidated Garrett v. New Jersey Transit Corporation and New Jersey Transit Corporation v. Colt are anticipated by the end of June.