In March 2010, a nine-month-old boy rolled off his sister’s bed in Jersey City, New Jersey, and got stuck between the bed and a cast-iron, steam radiator that was as hot as it’s supposed to be. The radiator delivered third-degree burns to the infant and left him with permanent scars.
The child’s parents sued their landlord and the case went all the way to New Jersey’s highest court. A year ago this month, in a split decision, a majority of the New Jersey Supreme Court dismissed the case and held that landlords in New Jersey have no obligation to cover or insulate dangerous radiators in apartments. Their reasoning was that a Department of Community Affairs regulation governing heating systems in buildings did not apply to the radiators in the rooms of that building.