In a provocative opinion, the Supreme Court of New Jersey last fall decided its first Spill Compensation and Control Act liability case in 15 years, N.J. Dep’t of Envtl. Prot. v. Dimant, 212 N.J. 153 (2012). The court’s thorough opinion addresses a wide range of important Spill Act issues that invite analysis and commentary.
In Dimant, DEP sued to recover costs it had incurred in the investigation and remediation of contaminated ground water that had adversely impacted private wells in Bound Brook. Although DEP named several defendants, the only one remaining at the time of trial was Sue’s Clothes Hanger (Sue’s). The trial court found that the department had failed to establish that a "discharge" as defined by the Spill Act had taken place during Sue’s operation of its dry cleaning business. The court dismissed the suit on the basis that the DEP "did not establish by a preponderance of the direct and circumstantial evidence that there is a nexus between any discharge by defendant Sue’s [ ] and the ground water contamination at issue." The department appealed.
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