Zucker v. Baker

47 Misc. 2d 840, 263 N.Y.S.2d 422, 1965 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1541
CourtNew York Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 1, 1965
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 47 Misc. 2d 840 (Zucker v. Baker) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Zucker v. Baker, 47 Misc. 2d 840, 263 N.Y.S.2d 422, 1965 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1541 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1965).

Opinion

Lester Holtzman, J.

Defendants, William Brooks Baker and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, move for summary judgment.

This is an action by the administratrix of the goods and chattels of the decedent, Marvin Jerome Zucker, to recover damages for personal injuries, wrongful death and damage to his motor vehicle sustained when he was struck by a motor vehicle operated by the defendant Baker in the course of his employment by the defendant Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The accident occurred near Bye, New York. A prior action for personal injuries, wrongful death and damage to the motor vehicle was instituted in the Federal District Court in Connecticut whose jurisdiction was based on diversity of citizenship. In that action the administratrix brought suit against one Hugo Vogt, alleging that he served liquor to defendant [842]*842Baker while said defendant was intoxicated. That action was based on the Connecticut Dram Statute (Conn. Gen. Stat., § 30-102) which provides: “If any person, by himself or his agent, sells any alcoholic liquor to an intoxicated person, and such purchaser, in consequence of such intoxication, thereafter injures the person or property of another, such seller shall pay just damages to the person injured, up to the amount of twenty thousand dollars, or to persons injured in consequence of such intoxication up to an aggregate amount of fifty thousand dollars, to be recovered in an action under this section, provided the aggrieved person or persons shall give written notice to such seller within sixty days of the occurrence of such injury to person or property of his or their intention to. bring an action under this section. Such notice shall specify the time, the date and the person to whom such sale was made, the name and address of the person injured or whose property was damaged, and the time, date and place where the injury to person or property occurred. No action under the provisions of this section shall be brought but within one year from the date of the act or omission complained of.” (Emphasis supplied.) The jury returned a verdict in the sum of $13,000 in plaintiff’s favor and the judgment entered thereon was fully satisfied by the defendant in that action, Hugo Vogt.

The defendants herein argue in support of their defense of satisfaction that since the Connecticut statute has been construed by the courts of that State to be a compensatory statute, satisfaction of the judgment already recovered by plaintiff bars the present action. In support of their motion for summary judgment on that ground they cite Pierce v. Albanese (144 Conn. 241) and Laznovsky v. Furdanowicz (22 Conn. S. 297). In Pierce the court stated at page 250: 1 ‘ While it may be said that in one sense the statute is penal, nevertheless it is primarily remedial because it gives a remedy enforceable by an individual in a civil action and allows the recovery of damages in an amount commensurate with the injuries suffered.” In Laznovsky a pedestrian who was struck by an automobile driven by an intoxicated motorist brought an action under the Connecticut Dram Statute against ‘ ‘ bar operators ’ ’ who sold liquor to the motorist. The court, in sustaining the defense that the pedestrian had settled his cause of action against the motorist, stated (pp. 300-301): “The Connecticut Dram Shop Act, on the other hand, provides for the payment of ‘just damages’. * * * ‘The gravamen of the plaintiff’s cause of action is not negligence or wanton misconduct but rather a violation of [the Dram Shop Act]. This statute estab[843]*843lishes a cause of action based upon a specified course of conduct and the consequence of such conduct. ’ * * * In the opinion of the court, to permit the plaintiff in this action to be the beneficiary of a windfall which might result in double damages would be contrary to sound principles of law and public policy. It was not the intention of the legislature that anything more than ‘ just damages ’ be recovered. This means simply compensatory rather than exemplary or punitive damages.”

Plaintiff herein argues that the law of New York governs the question of the effect to be given to the satisfaction of the Connecticut judgment. She cites section 65 of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Law and more particularly section 11-101 of the General Obligations Law which provides:

“ 1. Any person who shall be injured in person, property, means of support, or otherwise by any intoxicated person, or by reason of the intoxication of any person, whether resulting in his death or not, shall have a right of action against any person who shall, by unlawful selling to or unlawfully assisting in procuring liquor for such intoxicated person, have caused or contributed to such intoxication; and in any such action such person shall have a right to recover actual and exemplary damages.

“2. In case of the death of either party, the action or right of action given by this section shall survive to or against his or her executor or administrator, and the amount so recovered by either wife or child shall be his or her sole and separate property.

“ 3. Such action may be brought in any court of competent jurisdiction.

“4. In any case where parents shall be entitled to such damages, either the father or mother may sue alone therefor, but recovery by one of such parties shall be a bar to suit brought by the other.”

Plaintiff contends that since the law of New York provides that recovery under the New York Dram Statute does not preclude further recovery against a negligent motorist, the satisfied Connecticut judgment does not bar recovery against the alleged negligent motorist herein. Plaintiff relies on Playford v. Perich (2 Misc 2d 170), an action brought by the administrator of the estate of passengers killed in an automobile accident against the tavern proprietors allegedly responsible for the intoxication of the deceased driver. There, the court held that recovery under the New York wrongful death statute did not diminish liability pursuant to the provisions of the Civil Rights Law (the forerunner of section 11-101 of the General Obligations [844]*844Law) which gave a person injured by an intoxicated person a right of action against a third party who caused or contributed to the intoxication. The court stated (p. 172): “ The action created by section 16 of the Civil Rights Law and its forerunner in earlier statutes is a creature of statute solely. It is not a common-law action. It is penal in nature. It is in the nature of a civil fine, the amount of which is to be determined by a jury, and the proceeds of which are to go to a private individual or individuals, and not into the public treasury.”

And (pp. 173-174): Parenthetically, it is seriously questionable that the defendant and the driver of the vehicle were joint tort-feasors even though the conduct of both may have contributed to the death. The statutory action against the driver is based on his negligence; the statutory action against the defendant is based not on negligence, but on willful violation of the statutory prohibition in a sphere wholly unrelated to negligence. ’ ’

The question here presented is the effect to be given by the courts of this State to the satisfied judgment based on the Connecticut compensatory Dram Shop Act rendered by the Federal District Court.

The action in which recovery was obtained involved the claim of the plaintiff against the restaurateur, Hugo Vogt.

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Related

Zucker v. Baker
26 A.D.2d 945 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1966)

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Bluebook (online)
47 Misc. 2d 840, 263 N.Y.S.2d 422, 1965 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 1541, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/zucker-v-baker-nysupct-1965.