Kenneth Ellman

Kenneth Ellman Overturns Hunterdon Medical Default Judgment.
Decision Protects You. Copyright 2015, Kenneth Ellman, All Rights Reserved.

As seen in the below Decision of the New Jersey Superior Court, Appellate Division dated March 6, 2015, Docket NO. A-1710-13T4, the Appellate Court overturned a Hunterdon County Superior Court decision allowing Hunterdon Medical Center to obtain a Default Judgment even though the Defendant filed an Answer with Counterclaims and Third Party Impleader. Here the Defendants/Parties In Interest properly contested the matter and filed Pleadings but the lower Court, in violation of the public policy of the State of New Jersey, refused to allow such Defense.

In these type of cases all too often a family is saddled with damaging and improper medical costs incurred in an emergency when families are faced with little choice and little opportunity to control the medical charges.

It has been seen that due to the failure to properly process medical insurance and charity claims the medical facility then goes after the family demanding payment and seeking Court Judgment. This damages a family with no public benefit and disgraces the medical care duty. Ironically, by aggressively seeking full and proper reimbursement for medical care on behalf of the patients/family from the proper agency, the medical facility could have protected itself and the patients. But due to the fact that patients are frequently perceived as debtors, the medical facility loses the opportunity to enlist the patients as allies to obtain full reimbursement. Patients and medical care providers should have Joint cause together to demand full and proper payment of medical claims instead of medical facilities turning against those they care for.

Many Defendants, not skilled or knowledgeable in law are at a loss as to how they can defend themselves. These families can then suffer serious consequences due the entry of a Default Judgment which becomes a public record and damages the people who did nothing more than seek medical care in an emergency.

As the Appellate Court discusses below, the conduct of the lower Court allowing a Default Judgment had to be overturned and the family was protected from this type of medical collection abuse.

The difficulty for families in these type of cases is that frequently they are unable to afford or obtain competent legal counsel or advice and do not know how to proceed Pro Se. The inability to obtain or afford Counsel, which can frequently exceed the amount of the dispute, coupled with the lack of knowledge of how to Defend, leads to Judicial enforcement of unproven Collection Agency type claims.

Here the Appellate Division fully reviewing what occurred took a strong position in favor of public protection and the fact finding duty of the Trial Court.
The Honorable Appellate Judges Haas and Higbee protected the people of New Jersey.

The Decision appears below in PDF.
Kenneth Ellman is interested in this type of abuse of process cases and interested parties should feel free to contact our office.