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

With Ironies Abounding, the United States Supreme Court Rules on Removal Under CAFA

Dart Cherokee Basin Operating Co., LLC v. Owens, ___ U.S. ___ (2014). This case reached a fairly simple conclusion: a notice of removal that removes to federal court a putative...

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,...

Check Out the ABA's 18th Annual Class Actions Institute- October 23-24, 2014, in Chicago

The 18th Annual American Bar Association Class Actions Institute will take place on October 23 and 24 at theWit Hotel in Chicago. The full brochure for the Institute can be found...

Placing Debtor's Account Number on Envelope of Collection Letter is Not Permitted by the FDCPA

Douglass v. Convergent Outsourcing, 765 F.3d 299 (3d Cir. 2014). The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, 15 U.S.C. §1692f(8) ("FDCPA"), forbids debt collectors from putting on the envelopes of debt...

The Availability of Class Arbitration is for a Court, Not an Arbitrator, to Decide

Opalinski v. Robert Half Int'l Inc., 761 F.3d 314 (3d Cir. 2014). In this case under the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. §201 et seq. ("FLSA"), plaintiffs signed employment agreements...

Securities Fraud Class Actions Survive

Halliburton Co. v. Erica P. John Fund, Inc., ___ U.S. ___ (2014). In general, in a securities fraud case under section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 15...

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...

Financial Conflicts of Interest in Federal Appeals

A report from the Center for Public Integrity, issued this morning and available at http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/04/28/14630/federal-judges-plead-guilty, addresses financial conflicts of interest in the United States Courts of Appeal. Both a federal statute and Canon...

Two Interesting Wrinkles on Waiver (or Non-Waiver) of Issues Purportedly Not Raised Below

Thompson v. Real Estate Mortgage Network, 748 F.3d 142 (3d Cir. 2014). This opinion, issued today by Judge Vanaskie, is an important one in that it clarifies the pleading standards...

Like a Bad Penny

Some dubious legislation, like a bad penny, keeps coming back on the scene. For a number of years, a bill that would allow appeals as of right of orders granting...

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 121314 15 16 17 18…Last

"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....