A federal judge in New Jersey granted summary judgment to Bally's Park Place in a personal injury claim filed by an employee who received workers' compensation for the same accident, holding that the New Jersey Supreme Court's 2022 opinion in Lapsley v. Twp. of Sparta supplied the correct legal framework for determining whether Bally's "controlled" the sidewalk where the injury occurred.

Plaintiff Coleen Donovan-Draper was working as a bartender at Bally's beach car in August 2019 when she twisted her ankle on the sidewalk at Bally's Park Place, according to the opinion. She received workers' compensation benefits for the injury, during which time she filed a negligence claim against Bally's to recover personal injury damages. Donovan-Draper filed a personal injury claim in Atlantic County Superior Court which Bally's removed to the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey in July 2021.