DeVries v. Habitat for Humanity

• Decision Date: 17 May 1996
• Docket Number: Docket No. C,No. 7651,7651
• Citation: 290 N.J.Super. 479,676 A.2d 152
• Parties: Lambert DeVRIES and Alice S. DeVries, husband and wife, Plaintiffs-Respondents, v. HABITAT FOR HUMANITY, Defendant-Appellant, and Rutherford Congregational Church, Defendant. DecisionLawum 95 341.
• Court: New Jersey Superior Court — Appellate Division

Page 479

290 N.J.Super. 479

676 A.2d 152

Lambert DeVRIES and Alice S. DeVries, husband and wife Plaintiffs-Respondents, v. HABITAT FOR HUMANITY, Defendant-Appellant and Rutherford Congregational Church, Defendant.

Decision No. 7651.

Law Docket No. Cum 95 341.

Superior Court of New Jersey Appellate Division.

Argued March 20, 1996.

Decided May 17, 1996.

John F. Gaffney, Morristown, for appellant (Smetana & Mahoney, attorneys; Mr. Gaffney, on the brief).

Mariangela Chiaravallotti, Saddle River, for respondents (Lewis & McKenna, attorneys; Ms. Chiaravallotti, on the brief).

Before Judges KING, LANDAU and KLEINER.

The opinion of the court was delivered by

KING, P.J.A.D.

I.

Defendant Paterson Habitat for Humanity (Habitat) appeals on leave granted from the denial of its motion for summary judgment in a suit brought by a volunteer who was injured while working on a Habitat construction project. Habitat contends that it is entitled to immunity under the charitable immunity statute, N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-7. We conclude that a volunteer worker who conferred a benefit on Habitat and received no benefit in return other than personal satisfaction was not a "beneficiary" under N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-7 and is entitled to bring a tort action.

II.

Lambert DeVries and his wife filed suit against defendants Rutherford Congregational Church and Habitat, claiming that he had been injured while working as a volunteer on a Habitat construction project. The church obtained a voluntary dismissal because it did not own the property under construction.

Defendant Habitat claimed immunity from liability under N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-7 and moved for summary judgment. Judge Hamer denied Habitat's summary judgment motion, finding that DeVries was not "a direct beneficiary" of Habitat. We granted Habitat's motion for leave to appeal. R. 2:2-4.

Plaintiff is a retired telephone company employee who first learned of Paterson Habitat For Humanity in the spring of 1991. While attending a church service, he heard that Habitat was seeking volunteer workers. He reported to a Habitat construction site the following Saturday and assisted in the yard clean-up of a completed unit. While there, he discovered that a group of volunteers usually assembled on Wednesdays to work on a house still under construction. He volunteered his services on most Wednesdays and a few Saturdays until construction on that house was completed. Later, he volunteered for another construction project. In all, he did volunteer construction work for Habitat fairly consistently for over a year.

On October 21, 1992 plaintiff reported to work on a project at 39 Stout Street in Paterson. He was told to perform electrical work on the second floor of a unit. There was no floor or ceiling dividing the levels and he had to climb a ladder to the second floor. He was holding onto a board when it separated from the wall as he climbed down the ladder. He fell about fourteen feet to the basement, landed on his back, and suffered serious injuries.

Habitat is a nonprofit corporation, organized for these purposes, according to its certificate of incorporation:

(1) To implement the gospel of Jesus Christ in the world working with economically disadvantaged people to help them create a better human habitat in which to live and work.

(2) To help poor but financially stable families obtain simple, adequate and easily affordable owner-occupied housing, using low down payments, sweat equity and no-interest mortgages.

(3) To aid Christians and others by providing them with opportunities to volunteer their time and efforts and with practical and effective ways to share their abundance to meet the needs of others in response to God's command.

(4) To generally promote and advance religious and charitable, social and educational purposes.

5) To engage in any activities within the purposes for which a nonprofit corporation may be organized under Title 15A of the New Jersey Statutes, so long as such activities shall be consistent with the purposes, goals and Bylaws of the Corporation and consistent with law.

III.

Many state courts, including New Jersey's, developed a common-law charitable immunity doctrine in the early part of this century. Today, nearly every state has renounced or severely limited this common-law doctrine. Several states still grant at least partial immunity to charitable organizations, sometimes through statute. See Note, The Quality of Mercy: "Charitable Torts" and their continuing Immunity, 100 Harv. L.Rev. 1382 (1987).

New Jersey's common-law charitable immunity doctrine was judicially abolished in Collopy v. Newark Eye and Ear Infirmary, 27 N.J. 29, 141 A.2d 276 (1958); Dalton v. St. Luke's Catholic Church, 27 N.J. 22, 141 A.2d 273 (1958); and Benton v. Y.M.C.A., 27 N.J. 67, 141 A.2d 298 (1958). Soon after these decisions, the New Jersey Legislature enacted a statute, ultimately codified as N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-7, which granted a limited immunity from liability to certain nonprofit corporations. The statute provides:

No nonprofit corporation, society or association organized exclusively for religious, charitable, educational or hospital purposes shall, except as is hereinafter set forth, be liable to respond in damages to any person who shall suffer damage from the negligence of any agent or servant of such corporation, society or association, where such person is a beneficiary, to whatever degree, of the works of such nonprofit corporation, society or association; provided, however, that such immunity from liability shall not extend to any person who shall suffer damage from the negligence of such corporation, society, or association or of its agents of servants where such person is one unconcerned in and unrelated to and outside of the benefactions of such corporation, society or association, but nothing herein contained shall be deemed to exempt the said agent or servant individually from their liability for any such negligence.

[Emphasis supplied.]

N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-10 provides that the statute "shall be liberally construed so as to afford immunity ... in furtherance of the public policy for the protection of" charitable organizations. But this grant of immunity was intentionally limited. These organizations are still liable for injuring anyone "unconcerned in and unrelated to and outside of the benefactions of" the nonprofit entity. A more recent statute, N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-7.1, L. 1987, c. 87, § 1, grants absolute or unconditional immunity from tort liability to most persons performing work for a charitable or non-profit organization--unpaid officers, directors, trustees and members, as well as volunteer workers--unless their behavior is wilful, wanton, or grossly negligent. There is, of course, no statute which gives a charitable organization immunity to suits brought by volunteer workers who serve the charity's goals.

Since the parties do not dispute that Habitat is a "nonprofit corporation, society, or association organized exclusively for religious, charitable, educational or hospital purposes," the single issue is whether plaintiff, a volunteer laborer on a construction project, was "a beneficiary, to whatever degree, of the works" of Habitat or was "outside of the benefactions" of the organization.

Plaintiff did not expect the benefit of low-cost housing provided by Habitat. Defendant Habitat argues that plaintiff is, nevertheless, a beneficiary of the organization and urges us to look to the purposes expressed in its certificate of incorporation--"to aid Christians and others by providing them with opportunities to volunteer their time and efforts ..." and "to generally promote and advance religious and charitable, social and educational purposes"--and to conclude that volunteer workers like plaintiff are intended beneficiaries of the organization.

We do not find the corporate purposes enumerated in the certificate of incorporation dispositive of whether an individual is a beneficiary under the statute. Were this the test, every non-profit corporation could unilaterally insulate itself from tort liability merely by setting forth a comprehensive list of beneficiaries sufficiently broad to include all possible claimants. A more objective and less self-serving interpretation of the scope of the "benefactions" of a charity is required.

"[A] purpose set forth in a certificate of incorporation is not conclusive as to whether an organization is in fact a charitable one." Allen v. Summit Civic Found., 250 N.J.Super. 427, 431, 594 A.2d 1361 (Law Div.1991). Likewise, a certificate of incorporation is not conclusive on whether a particular individual is a beneficiary of that organization. While considering an organization's stated purpose is useful as a factor in the beneficiary determination, we decline to treat it as the talisman by which claimants are within or outside a particular organization's benefactions.

We think it equally true that plaintiff's subjective motivations should not control determination of status as a beneficiary under the statute. In Peacock v. Burlington County Historical Society, 95 N.J.Super. 205, 230 A.2d 513 (App.Div.), certif. denied, 50 N.J. 290, 234 A.2d 399 (1967), the plaintiff accompanied her husband to the society's library solely for the purpose of companionship, glanced at some of the exhibits to pass the time, and was injured when she tried to sit in a chair which slipped beneath her. We held that she was a beneficiary, despite her subjective belief that she did not derive a benefit from the library.

Plaintiff's personal motivations are not the test, even when those motivations match a stated purpose in the organization's certificate of incorporation. A more objective standard is required. The test generally should be whether the injured person was at the time bestowing benefactions upon the charity or receiving them. In the case before us, plaintiff testified that he volunteered his services because "[i]t sounded like a worthwhile...