A caseworker who worked in New Jersey was assaulted by her ex-husband in her employer’s parking lot. She suffered an injury and filed for workers’ compensation, saying that her company was negligent and disclosed her new work location to her estranged ex-husband. By doing that, she said, her employer increased the likelihood that she might be attacked at work, and the attack was no longer a personal relationship matter.

Jennie Rosario worked for New Jersey’s Division of Youth and Family Services as a caseworker. She had been working at the East Orange location, but had asked to be transferred to the Maplewood office because she was afraid her ex-husband would come looking for her at work. Her ex-husband, who she had secured a divorce from days before her attack, also had a restraining order against him for trying to murder Rosario’s mother. She was worried that once her ex-husband got out of jail he would try to find her at work, so she went to work at Maplewood so he would not know where to find her. He called the East Orange department to try and find out where she had been transferred and the receptionist told him that she was now working at Maplewood.

On May 23, 2007, Rosario’s ex-husband sliced her head in the parking lot at the Maplewood office while she was going out to do field work. He then stabbed himself. The police arrived at the scene and apprehended him before he could do any more harm. When Rosario filed a workers’ comp claim, the Judge of Compensation ruled that the attack was a personal risk and not work-related, as it could have taken place anywhere. That it happened at her place of work was coincidental, but not compensable.

Rosario appealed this decision and said that her employer told her husband where she was located; she said they had a copy of the restraining order against him and should not have told him her new location. The appellate court decided that the attack came about because of a personal relationship, and not because of an argument or problem at the workplace. They said that even if the employer did something negligent in telling the ex-husband her location, the issue at hand was whether or not the injury was work-related. Other than the fact that it took place in the workplace parking lot, it was a personal matter and not one relating to the workplace so she could not collect benefits.