Cruz v. Spec Personnel, LLC

── Cruz v. Spec Personnel, LLC ── Court: Connecticut Appellate Court Date: June 02, 2026 Author: Alvord Category: General ************************************************ The “officially released” date that appears near the beginning of an opinion is the date the opinion will be published in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it is released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the beginning of all time periods for the filing of postopinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecti- cut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying an opinion that appear in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced or distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publications, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. ************************************************  Cruz v. Spec Personnel, LLC JUAN CRUZ ET AL. v. SPEC PERSONNEL, LLC, ET AL. (AC 46515) Alvord, Moll and Keller, Js.* Syllabus The defendant S Co. appealed from the trial court’s judgment for the plain- tiffs, J and E, rendered following a jury trial. J sustained serious workplace injuries when an approximately 1300 pound load of lights, which had been sold and shipped by S Co. to J’s employer, R Co., fell onto him. Following delivery to R Co., the lights, which had not been secured by stretch wrap to the pallet on which they had been delivered, were placed on the top shelf of a storage rack in a warehouse operated by R Co. The lights subsequently slid off the pallet onto J after a temporary staffer for R Co., while operating a reach truck, made contact with the lights. J’s wife, E, claimed an attendant loss of consortium. S Co. claimed, inter alia, that the court, in denying its postverdict motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, improperly concluded that, as a product shipper, it owed a duty of care that extended to J and the type of harm he suffered in the postdelivery warehouse accident. Held: The trial court, in denying the defendant’s postverdict motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, improperly determined that S Co. owed a duty of care to protect against J’s workplace injuries, as J’s workplace injuries were not a reasonably foreseeable consequence of S Co.’s presumed failure to secure the lights to the pallet by stretch wrap before they were shipped. Argued October 10, 2024—officially released June 2, 2026 Procedural History Action to recover damages for, inter alia, the defen- dants’ alleged negligence, and for other relief, brought to the Superior Court in the judicial district of Hartford and transferred to the judicial district of Waterbury, where Rexel Holdings USA Corp. intervened as a plain- tiff; thereafter, Signify North America Corporation et al. were cited in as defendants; subsequently, the plain- tiff AdaMaria Medina et al. withdrew from the action; thereafter, the named plaintiff et al. withdrew the action * This appeal originally was argued before a panel of this court con- sisting of Judges Alvord, Moll, and Flynn. Thereafter, Judge Flynn recused himself and did not participate in the consideration of the case. Justice Keller was added to the panel and has read the briefs and appendices, and listened to a recording of the oral argument prior to participating