NJ Appellate Law Blog

Plaintiffs Can Seek to Be Accompanied to a Defense Medical Examination by a Third Person or to Record the Examination, and (Contrary to the Appellate Division) Plaintiffs Do Not Bear the Burden of Pro

DiFiore v. Pezic, 254 N.J. 212 (2023). [Disclosure: Catherine B. Derenze, my colleague at Lite DePalma Greenberg & Afanador, LLC, argued before the Supreme Court in this case on behalf...

Two Law Against Discrimination Decisions by the Appellate Division

Beneduci v. Graham Curtin P.A., 476 N.J. Super. 73 (App. Div. 2023); Guzman v. M. Texeira Int'l, Inc., 476 N.J. Super. 64 (App. Div. 2023). The Appellate Division issued two...

School Board Has No Duty to Notify Tenured Full-Time Teachers Who Seek to Move to Part-Time That They May Lose Tenure Rights, But Boards are "Encourage[d]" To Do So

Parsells v. Somerville Bd. of Educ., 254 N.J. 152 (2023). Justice Fasciale wrote the Court's unanimous opinion in this case today. Plaintiff lost on the legal issue that prompted the...

No Need for Attorney Retainer Agreements to State Expressly That Billing Will be in Tenths of an Hour or Other Increments

Arbus, Maybruch & Goode, LLC v. Cohen, 475 N.J. Super. 509 (App. Div. 2023). In this suit by a law firm to collect its fee from a client (actually, an...

What is a "Class Action" Under the Class Action Fairness Act?

Erie Ins. Exchange v. Erie Indemnity Co., 68 F.4th 815 (3d Cir. 2023). As Judge Smith stated in his opinion in this case, the Class Action Fairness Act of 2005,...

A Class Action Waiver is Unenforceable Absent a Mandatory Arbitration Provision

Pace v. Hamilton Cove, 475 N.J. Super. 568 (App. Div. 2023). Class action waivers have infested numerous areas of our commercial lives, including cellphone contracts, banking agreements, and other documents...

An Unusual Restrictive Employment Covenant Opinion From the Appellate Division

Accounteks.net, Inc. v. CKR Law, LLP, 475 N.J. Super. 493 (App. Div. 2023). The Appellate Division sometimes publishes one version of an opinion and designates as unpublished a longer version...

Justice Fasciale Discusses "How Trial Judge Experience Shapes Intermediate Appellate Review of Discretionary Determinations"

For many, most law review articles have little relevance. But a recent article by Justice Fasciale, published in the Seton Hall Law Review at 53 Seton Hall L. Rev. 1043...

The Effect of Supreme Court Dictum

In re Registrant R.H., 475 N.J. Super. 460 (App. Div. 2023). This opinion by Judge Mayer addressed two consolidated Megan's Law cases. In each case, defendants sought to terminate their...

A "Hostile/Warlike" Exclusion in an Insurance Policy Does Not Bar Coverage for a Cyberattack

Merck & Co., Inc. v. Ace American Ins. Co., 475 N.J. Super. 420 (App. Div. 2023). Plaintiff ("Merck") suffered a cyberattack from malware known as NotPetya. An expert for Merck's...

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 111213 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84…Last

The Second and Third Published Appellate Division Decisions of the Current Term

As September turned to October, the Appellate Division issued its second and third published opinions of the Term. One was a decision by Judge Vinci in a civil appeal. The other ruling, in a criminal appeal, was authored by Judge Perez Friscia....

Appellate Division Oral Argument of the Week: Did it Violate a Class Action Settlement That Barred Mass Opt-Outs to Allow Opt-Outs From a Marketing Campaign That Solicited Opt-outs?

On Tuesday, September 30, judges on Part G of the Appellate Division will hear oral argument in Esposito v. Cellco Partnership d/b/a Verizon Wireless. The case follows from a $100 million nationwide class action settlement that had required class members who decided to exclude themselves from the settlement and potentially pursue their own litigation against Verizon to opt out individually, and barred mass opt-outs. However, Murphy Advocates, LLC, a Colorado law firm conducted a marketing campaign to create a mass opt-out that attracted about 11,000 class members who responded to Murphy that they wished to opt out....

A Pair of New Criminal Appeals for the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court announced that it has granted certification in two new cases. Both are criminal appeals. One is from a published opinion of the Appellate Division, while the other is from an unpublished per curiam decision by a three-judge panel....

Can a Plaintiff in a Civil Case Refuse to Testify at Trial After Being Served With a Defense Notice in Lieu of Subpoena and Having Been Ordered to Testify by the Trial Judge? An Anniversary

On this date in 2005, the Supreme Court decided Gonzalez v. Safe & Sound Sec. Corp., 185 N.J. 100 (2005). The case involved a plaintiff who was shot in an apartment building in Atlantic City, which left him paralyzed. He brought a negligence suit against a number of defendants, including Atlantic City Housing & Urban Renewal Associates ("ACHURA"), the owner of the apartment building....