When the death of a person is caused by a wrongful act, neglect or default, such as would, if death had not ensued, have entitled the person injured to maintain an action for damages resulting from the injury, the person who would have been liable in damages for the injury if death had not ensued shall be liable in an action for damages, notwithstanding the death of the person injured and although the death was caused under circumstances amounting in law to a crime.
N.J. Stat. Ann. § 2A:31-1
When action lies
Applied in 7 court decisions — leading case 523 So. 2d 1042 - Tatum v. Schering Corp. (1988)
Most recently applied in Megan Gunter v. Township of Lumberton (July 2013)
L.1951 (1st SS), c.344.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Current official text: New Jersey Legislature. Digitized from the New Jersey Legislature bulk statutes download. Reproduced from public-domain New Jersey statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.