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

The New Jersey Law Journal Ranks the Appellate Division Judges

This week's New Jersey Law Journal contains the result of a Law Journal survey of practitioners who were asked to rate the judges of the Appellate Division in nine separate...

Last Night's MCBA Appellate Practice Seminar: A Big Hit

Last night, the Morris County Bar Association presented "New Jersey Appellate Practice: Tips from the Bench and Bar." The program and participants were discussed here. Roughly 125 people attended, and...

The Beat Goes On: Another Appellate Division Win for LDG and the City of Hoboken

Bloomfield 206 Corp. v. City of Hoboken, 2014 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2175 (App. Div. Sept. 4, 2014). It is not the goal of this blog to publicize the successes of...

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...

Another LDG Appellate Division Win

Heine v. City of Paterson, 2014 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 2094 (App. Div. Aug. 26, 2014). This per curiam opinion, issued today by Judges Nugent amd Carroll, affirms a decision of...

A Warning to Appellate Lawyers From Judge Fuentes

Walters v. YMCA, 437 N.J. Super. 111 (App. Div. 2014). This decision by Judge Fuentes, issued today, reverses a grant of summary judgment in favor of the YMCA in what...

Supreme Court Guideline Barring Lawyers From Posting Accurate Quotes From Judges on Law Firm Websites is Invalid

Dwyer v. Cappell, 762 F.3d 275 (3d Cir. 2014). Andrew Dwyer is a lawyer who handles plaintiffs' employment law litigation. Evidently, some judges have said favorable things about him in...

Morris County Bar Association MCLE Seminar- "New Jersey Appellate Practice: Tips From the Bench and Bar"

In September 2013, the Morris County Bar Association presented a seminar titled "Building the Trial Record and Arguing it on Appeal." The panelists were Justice Patterson, Judges Sabatino, Stern, and...

Supreme Court Announces Court Rule Amendments Effective September 1, 2014

The Supreme Court today published Court Rule amendments that (except for certain changes that will take effect on January 1, 2015) that will become effective on September 1, 2014. Those amendments...

Two Appellate Division Wins for LDG

My firm, Lite DePalma Greenberg, LLC, was successful in two Appellate Division cases within the last few days. Last week, in Villaquiran v. All-State International, Inc., 2014 N.J. Super. Unpub....

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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....