NJ Appellate Law Blog – NJ Appellate Lawyer Bruce D. Greenberg blogs about Appeals and Appellate Law Practice

Unclear Arbitration Clauses Will Not be Enforced

Atalese v. U.S. Legal Servs. Grp., L.P., 219 N.J. 430 (2014). Plaintiff entered into a contract with defendant for debt-adjustment services. The contract contained an arbitration clause that did not...

Quest Defeats Class Certification at the Third Circuit

Grandalski v. Quest Diagnostics, Inc., 767 F.3d 175 (3d Cir. 2014). Plaintiffs filed a putative class action in which they alleged that defendant, a company that performs medical lab tests,...

No Presumption of Irreparable Harm in Lanham Act Injunction Cases

Ferring Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Watson Pharmaceuticals,, Inc., 765 F.3d 205 (3d Cir. 2014). Plaintiff Ferring and defendant Watson (now known as Actavis, Inc.) are competing pharmaceutical companies. Each company markets...

More Juice for the Lemon Law

Casal v. Hyundai Motor America, 436 N.J. Super. 296 (App. Div. 2014). In this case under the Lemon Law, N.J.S.A. 56:12-32(a)(1), which includes a fee-shifting provision for successful claimants, the...

No En Banc Review or Rehearing in Carrera v. Bayer

Carrera v. Bayer Corp., 727 F.3d 300 (3d Cir. 2013), severely restricted class certification in cases that involve products of whose purchasers selling defendants do not keep records. That is the...

No Nursing Home Act Violation, and Therefore No Consumer Fraud Act or TCCWNA Violation Either

Manahawkin Convalescent v. O'Neill, 217 N.J. 99 (2014). This comprehensive opinion by Justice Patterson for a unanimous Court ultimately boils down to this: because plaintiff, a nursing home, did not violate the...

A Wise Decision Under the Consumer Fraud Act

D'Agostino v. Maldonado, 216 N.J. 168 (2013). The requirement of the Consumer Fraud Act, N.J.S.A. 56:8-19 ("CFA"), that a consumer sustain an "ascertainable loss" as a prerequisite to recovery has...

Class Ascertainability- The Third Circuit Approaches the Precipice

Carrera v. Bayer Corp., 727 F.3d 300 (3d Cir. 2013). In Marcus v. BMW of North America, Inc., 687 F.3d 583 (3d Cir. 2012), the Third Circuit embarked on a very dangerous path...

The Consumer Fraud Act in Condominium Construction Defect Litigation

Belmont Condominium Ass'n, Inc. v. Geibel, 432 N.J. Super. 52 (App. Div. 2013). This case resulted in another magnum opus by Judge Parrillo. Plaintiff sued over defective construction of a...

Supreme Court Says TCCWNA Gives Broad Protections to Consumers

Shelton v. Restaurant.com, Inc., 214 N.J. 419 (2013). [Disclosure: I argued this case in the Supreme Court for the successful plaintiffs]. This consumer protection case has had a long odyssey. Originally filed...

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"Hot Fun in the Summertime": Appellate Division Summer Parts

In an Order available here, Chief Justice Rabner announced the lineup for the Appellate Division's summer Parts. As has been customary, the "summer" runs not between the meteorological start and end dates for summer, nor from Memorial Day to Labor Day, but from June 16 through September 7....

The Supreme Court Confirms That Municipalities Can be Subjected to Sanctions for Frivolous Litigation

Borough of Englewood Cliffs v. Trautner, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). This appeal presented the question of whether municipalities can be liable to pay sanctions for frivolous litigation, under the Frivolous Litigation Statute, N.J.S.A. 2A:15-59.1 ("the FLS"). In a 5-0 opinion written by Justice Fasciale (Chief Justice Rabner and Justice Hoffman did not participate), the Court affirmed, as modified, the decision of the Appellate Division that upheld the Law Division's imposition of FLS sanctions against the Borough....

The "Castle Doctrine"

State v. Bragg, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). A jury found defendant guilty of twelve charged counts, including attempted murder, kidnapping, aggravated assault, terroristic threats, possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, endangering, and two lesser-included offenses of harassment. Some of those charges involved the use of deadly force. Persons may not use deadly force if the can retreat with complete safety. But under the "castle doctrine," an exception to the general rule, a person "is not obliged to retreat from his dwelling, unless he was the initial aggressor." N.J.S.A. 2C:3-4(b)(2)(b)(i). That doctrine derives from the common law....

No Arbitrariness in Rejection of Public Construction Bid That Failed to Include a Properly Signed, Required Consent of Surety

In the Matter of Protest Filed by El Sol Contracting and Construction Corp., Contract T100.638, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). This public bidding case resulted in a 5-2 split at the Supreme Court, the first non-unanimous ruling of the current Term. Justice Hoffman wrote the majority opinion, while Justice Fasciale authored the dissent for himself and Justice Pierre-Louis....