Summary
holding that § 388 applies though none of the parties domiciled in lex loci delicti, New Jersey
Summary of this case from ROBERTS v. XTRA LEASE, INC.Opinion
January 13, 1998
Appeal from the Supreme Court, New York County (Barbara Kapnick, J.).
Since Vehicle and Traffic Law § 388 is a loss-allocating rule, as to which the jurisdiction of the parties' domiciles has paramount interest ( Schultz v. Boy Scouts, 65 N.Y.2d 189, 197), and since the statute is consistent with the law of all of the parties' domiciles, the court properly concluded that New York law, rather than that of New Jersey, the locus of the accident, should govern. Application of section 388 would thus be consistent with the parties' expectations ( Diehl v. Ogorewac, 836 F. Supp. 88, 92-94), and since none of the parties is domiciled in New Jersey, that State will neither be benefitted nor burdened by the outcome of this litigation. Under these circumstances, the fact that the parties are domiciled in different States does not require application of the law of the locus of the accident as a "tie-breaker". We have considered defendants' remaining arguments and find them to be without merit.
Concur — Sullivan, J.P., Milonas, Ellerin, Nardelli and Mazzarelli, JJ.