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

The Latest Grants of Supreme Court Review: Life Insurance (Another Certified Question), Unemployment Compensation, Parental Rights, and Parole Ineligibility

The Supreme Court announced four more cases that will come before it. The subject matters, and the paths that the cases took to reach the Court, are quite varied. Sun...

Another Certified Question Case From the Third Circuit, and Another Criminal Appeal, for the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court announced that it will take up two more matters. One is a certified question from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in a consumer protection context, specifically,...

Mandatory E-Filing Coming to the Appellate Division This Fall, So Get Your Training for That

In a Notice to the Bar that is available here, the Appellate Division announced that it "anticipates that e-filing of appeals will be made mandatory in the fall of 2017."...

Practice Pointers From the Colorado Court of Appeals

I have an oral argument coming up in the Colorado Court of Appeals, the intermediate state appellate court there. That court offers some helpful tips about oral argument, under the...

An Anniversary in Supreme Court Certified Questions

In recent years, acceptance by the Supreme Court of questions certified to it by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals under Rule 2:12A has become somewhat more frequent, though still...

Tomorrow's Anticipated Blizzard Affects Oral Arguments in New Jersey's Appellate Courts and in the Third Circuit Court of Appeals

The Supreme Court has announced that it has adjourned the oral arguments scheduled for tomorrow. One of the cases to be argued was a major consumer class action case, Dugan...

A New Third Circuit Chief Judge

As of October 1, Judge Smith has succeeded Judge McKee as Chief Judge of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Judge McKee has been Chief Judge since 2010, succeeding Judge Scirica in...

Donald Trump Offers More Potential Supreme Court Nominees

Back in May, Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump announced a list of eleven potential nominees to the Supreme Court of the United States. As discussed here, one of those candidates,...

Judge Leonard Garth (1921-2016)

Judge Leonard I. Garth died last week at age 95. Born in Brooklyn on April 27, 1921, he went to college at Columbia and got his law degree at Harvard....

Judge Sloviter Will Go on Inactive Status

Chief Judge McKee announced today that Judge Sloviter will assume inactive status as a judge of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. She made that decision due to "a serious...

1 234…Last

Retired Policeman's Pension Benefits Were Wrongly Paid to His Estranged Spouse Rather Than to His Estate, Where He Had Not Designated Anyone to Receive the Pension Benefit if He Died

Isaac v. Board of Trustees, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). Two kinds of benefits are payable to retired members of the.Police and Firemen's Retirement System ("PFRS"). One is a pension benefit, a part of the member's compensation for past services. Pension benefits go to the person whom the member designates, or to the member's estate if no designation is made. The other is a survivor's benefit, which goes to the member's widow for the duration of his or her widowhood. Former Newark policeman Keith Isaac made no designation as to his pension benefits, though he did list his estranged wife, Roxanne, as his spouse when he filed for retirement. Based on that, Isaac's pension benefits were distributed to Roxanne. Isaac's estate contested that, and today the Supreme Court held that the estate should have gotten the pension monies....

The Supreme Court Clarifies New Jersey's Automobile Exception to the Requirement of a Search Warrant

State v. Fenimore, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). Both the United States and New Jersey Constitutions protect the people against "unreasonable searches and seizures" and prohibit the issuance of search warrants without "probable cause." Both federal and New Jersey law, however, recognize an "automobile exception" to the warrant requirement. But New Jersey's automobile exception is narrower than the federal exception, as the Supreme Court stated in State v. Witt, 223 N.J. 409 (2015). Today, the Supreme Court ruled that the Appellate Division in this case had interpreted Witt too broadly in reversing a Law Division decision to exclude evidence from a warrantless search. The Supreme Court reversed and excluded the evidence....

"Liberal Standards" for Standing "Are Not Equivalent to No Standards At All," the Supreme Court Says

New Jersey Coalition of Automotive Retailers, Inc. v. Ford Motor Co., ___ N.J. ___ (2025). As Justice Pierre-Louis observed in her opinion for a unanimous Court in this case today, New Jersey state courts have long "take[n] a more liberal approach to standing than federal law." But in this appeal, the statute sued upon, the Franchise Practices Act, N.J.S.A. 56:10-1 et seq. ("FPA"), stated that only a "franchisee" could sue its franchisor. Because plaintiff here ("NJCAR") was not a franchisee but an association of franchisees, NJCAR lacked standing to bring a FPA case....

Compassionate Release Act Does Not Require Physical Examination of Inmates Seeking Relief, But Denial of Relief in This Case Was Arbitrary and Capricious

M.R. v. New Jersey Department of Corrections, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). Plaintiff appealed the denial of his petition for release under the Compassionate Release Act, N.J.S.A. 30:4-123.51 ("CRA"). He argued that he had not been physically examined by a physician, and that the statute required a physical examination. The Appellate Division determined that the statute did not require a physical examination and upheld the denial of compassionate release. Today, in a unanimous opinion by Justice Hoffman, the Supreme Court agreed that no physical examination was required, but reversed the denial of compassionate relief as insupportable....