Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas Transfers Case to Centre County as Proper Venue

In the case of Pickering v. Associated Realty Prop. Mgt., Inc., Oct. Term 2023, No. 0613 (C.P. Phila. Co. Nov. 22, 2024 Bright, J.), the court issued a Rule 1925 Opinion in support of its granting of a Motion to Transfer of Venue be upheld in this wrongful death action involving a case in which the appellant’s decedent fell down a defective trash shoot in a building owned and/or operated by several of the Defendants.

In this matter, the trial court sustained the Defendants’ Preliminary Objections to venue in Philadelphia County and transferred the case to Centre County where the accident occurred.

The court noted that there was no evidence to establish that any of the Defendants regularly conducted business in Philadelphia County for purposes of venue. 

More specifically, the court noted that one of the Defendants had only made eight (8) sales in Philadelphia County over a seven (7) year period. That Defendant had approximately $73,000.00 of total sales in Philadelphia County over the $45 million dollars that the company had made over the seven (7) year period.

As such, the court found the record confirmed that none of the Defendants’ contacts with Philadelphia were regular or habitual enough to make Philadelphia proper venue for this cause of action. As such, the trial court requested the Superior Court to affirm its decision to transfer venue to Centre County where the Plaintiff’s cause of action arose.

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Source: The Legal Intelligencer Common Pleas Case Alert, www.Law.com (April 2, 2025).