Legal landscape note: This article was originally published in 2017 and was reviewed and updated for republication in July 2026. New Jersey law changes frequently.
You plan to plead guilty to the traffic ticket and put the accident behind you. The injured driver later files a civil case, however, and that guilty plea may be offered as an admission of negligence. A civil reservation requested in open court at the time of the plea can prevent the plea itself from being used as evidence in the later civil proceeding.
If you are involved in an accident with another vehicle and receive a traffic ticket due to it, such as Careless Driving or Unsafe Lane Change, pleading guilty can potentially be used as evidence against you.
If a civil case is started by the injured party the original plea of guilty can be used as an admission of negligence. This civil action generally must be started no later than two years after the accident (N.J.S.A. 2A:14-2), though limited exceptions exist. There is one very important way to help protect yourself from this potentially life changing outcome, and that's to file a civil reservation. A civil reservation is a court order, entered under Rule 7:6-2(a)(1) at the time of the guilty plea, that the plea 'shall not be evidential in any civil proceeding.'
In 2014, the Supreme Court of New Jersey reviewed the civil reservation in Maida v. Kuskin, 217 N.J. 50 (2014). In their opinion, they reiterated some aspects of the procedure such as the necessity that request for reservation be made in open court at the time of the plea, where the prosecutor or the victims may protest the decision. It also said that a Civil Reservation cannot be obtained without an appearance in the court.
An Illustrative Decision Point
Consider a hypothetical driver who plans to resolve an unsafe-lane-change ticket while an injured passenger is still receiving treatment. The municipal plea and any later civil claim are separate matters, but the words used in court can connect them. Waiting until after the plea to ask about a civil reservation may be too late for the protection described in this article.
Bring the summons, accident report, proposed plea terms, insurance correspondence, and any demand or civil pleading already received. Before the plea, counsel should decide whether to request a civil reservation in open court, whether anyone may object, and whether the planned statement creates a separate evidentiary issue. This hypothetical does not guarantee that a reservation will be granted or decide the later civil claim.