Congratulations to Marc R. Jones, Esquire and the GL Department of Cipriani & Werner’s New Jersey office for obtaining a favorable settlement in a complex commercial trucking/construction delay claim. The case was venued in the United States District Court of New Jersey, Camden Vicinage. The claim initially arose as a trucking accident in which our client, a resident of New Jersey, struck the rear of a tractor trailer in Connecticut.  The tractor trailer was hauling structural steel to a large multi-million dollar school construction project in Queens, New York.  The steel was not damaged by the impact.  However, since our client/driver was seriously injured by the impact, the Connecticut State Police impounded the steel for eight (8) days while conducting its accident investigation.  The steel contractor claimed that this impoundment set off a series of delays to their project that cost them over a $1.5 million in damages, which they were seeking compensation from our clients as a proximate cause of the accident.  Aggressive discovery was begun including multiple subpoenas for the entire construction project file (over 40,000 pages of records), weather analysis, as well as at numerous witness and party depositions.  A construction delay expert was also retained.  We were able to determine, through exhaustive discovery and analysis, that the steel contractor was already  behind schedule at the time of the accident, coupled with a wide variety of fabrication and installation issues that coincided, but were in no way related to, the accident involving our client.  A settlement conference conducted by the federal judge ultimately produced a resolution of the case, in which the Plaintiff accepted less than 15% of the case’s original proffered value. 

Cipriani & Werner offers focused and results-oriented legal services in state and federal courts.  If you have any questions or New Jersey matters that would benefit from our aggressive, cost-effective approach, please contact Matthew Mitchell, Esquire at mmitchell@c-wlaw.comor Marc Jones, Esquire at mjones@c-wlaw.com