A New York hotel where two guests were allegedly bitten by bedbugs is not liable for punitive damages, but may have been negligent in failing to investigate the full extent of a bedbug infestation, a judge has ruled.

The Milford Plaza Hotel was seeking to avoid any liability for the alleged bites suffered by Debra Grogan and her daughter during a two-night stay in January 2003. Since it had no prior complaints of bedbugs in that room, the hotel argued, it did not have any notice of an unsafe condition.

But Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Judith J. Gische said the Grogans could go to trial on a claim for compensatory damages because the report of the hotel's exterminator for the end of December 2002 showed bedbugs had infested two other rooms on the same floor.

“Even assuming that no guests complained about bedbugs in Room 1540 prior to the date of plaintiffs' stay in that room, plaintiffs have raised issues of fact whether defendants had constructive notice that bedbugs might have or could spread to Room 1540,” Gische wrote in a March 26 opinion.

Gische cited the testimony of Professor Robert J. Novak, an entomologist retained by the Grogans, who said bedbugs travel easily and proper eradication techniques required an inspection beyond the immediate site where they were observed on the 15th floor.

“The affidavit of Novak sets forth genuine issues of fact about the life span of bedbugs, how they migrate, and whether these factors should have been (or were) taken into consideration by the defendants in how rooms were treated following bedbug complaints by other guests,” she concluded.

The issue of liability for punitive damages was one of first impression in New York. But Gische distinguished the Grogans' case from one in which the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an award of punitives against a hotel operator who made a deliberate business decision to conceal a bedbug infestation from guests. Mathias v. Accor Economy Lodging, 347 F.3d 672 (2003).

“At bar, the issues of culpability relate to negligence only,” she said, going on to find that the Milford Plaza's actions “do not rise to the level of being a recklessness or a conscious disregard of the rights of others.”

By Matthew Heller
4/1/08