A New Jersey Appellate Division panel Thursday affirmed one of the largest jury awards for a personal injury case in 2023, which awarded nearly $5 million to a developmentally disabled woman after she fell on the dance floor of a banquet hall while attending an event.

Rose Pietrobon, a 57-year-old woman with special needs, was attending a first communion on May 3, 2015, at The Hanover Manor located in East Hanover. While walking onto the dance floor, Pietrobon stepped on a piece of fruit on the floor and fell, according to her complaint, filed in Essex County as Pietrobon v. The Hanover Manor.