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

2011-2012 Appellate Division Statistics

At last night's NJSBA Appellate Practice Committee meeting, we heard a report on Appellate Division statistics for the preceding court year (the meeting was to have occurred in the fall...

A Proposal to Increase the Time to Appeal From Municipal Court Decisions

A3228 was recently introduced in the Legislature byAssemblywoman Spencer (D-Essex). The bill would provide a 30-day period for filing a notice of appeal from municipal court decisions. The current time for appeal,...

Respondents May Need to Appeal in Order to Preserve Certain Arguments

HIP Heightened Independence and Progress, Inc. v. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, 693 F.3d 345 (3d Cir. 2012). Last year, the Third Circuit decided a case...

The "Excusable Neglect" Standard for an Extension of Time to File a Notice of Appeal

Ragguette v. Premier Wines & Spirits, 691 F.3d 315 (3d Cir. 2012). Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(5) allows an extension of time to file a notice of appeal upon...

Electronic Filing is Coming! Electronic Filing is Coming! (In the Appellate Division)

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals and the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey have each had electronic filing for a number of years. Now, the...

The Third Circuit Applies Judicial Estoppel

Macfarlan v. Ivy Hill SNF, LLC, 675 F.3d 266 (3d Cir. 2012). "Judicial estoppel is a ‘judge-made doctrine that seeks to prevent a litigant from asserting a position inconsistent with one that...

"A Procedural Swamp"

Lombardi v. Masso, 207 N.J. 517 (2011). In this case, a Law Division judge granted summary judgment to certain defendants. The judge then denied plaintiff's motion for reconsideration. Another defendant had defaulted....

New Jersey Appellate Rule Amendments Effective September 1, 2011

The Supreme Court of New Jersey has adopted changes to two appellate rules. Both changes will go into effect on September 1, 2011. First, the list of judgments deemed to...

Appellate Jurisdiction and the Duty of Candor to the Court– All in a Four-Page Opinion

K.L.G. v. D.M.., 2011 WL 2321404 (App. Div. June 29, 2011). Rule 2:9-1(a) provides that once a notice of appeal is filed, "supervision and control" of the case pass to the...

File Those Bankruptcy Appeals Timely… Or Else!

In re Caterbone, 640 F.3d 108 (3d Cir. 2011). Stanley Caterbone filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition. The Trustee successfully moved to have the petition dismissed on various grounds. The dismissal was...

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No Ethics Violation in Attorney Purchasing Another Attorney's Name as a Keyword for Internet Searches, the Supreme Court Says, With a Caveat

In re Opinion No. 735 of the Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Professional Ethics, ___ N.J. ___ (2025). [Disclosure: I represented an amicus curiae in this appeal]. As Justice Noriega said in his opinion for a 5-1 majority (Justice Pierre-Louis did not participate), this appeal "presents the narrow question of whether it is permissible under the Rules of Professional Conduct (RPC) for an attorney or law firm to purchase a competing attorney's or law firm's name as a keyword." The Court found it permissible, with a caveat. Justice Fasciale dissented....

Four Criminal Law Cases, and a Qui Tam Appeal, for the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court announced today that it has granted review in five new appeals. One of them is before the Court on leave to appeal, while in the others the Court granted certification....

The "Limited Attorney Exemption" of the Debt Adjustment and Credit Counseling Act is Held Unconstitutional as Violative of the Separation of Powers and Void for Vagueness

Anchor Law Firm, PLLC v. State of New Jersey, ___ N.J. Super. ___ (App. Div. 2025). The Debt Adjustment and Credit Counseling Act, N.J.S.A. 17:16G-1 et seq. ("DACCA"), prohibits debt adjusters in New Jersey from operating for a profit. There is an exception for attorneys not "principally engaged" (a term not defined in the statute) in debt adjustment. That exception, adopted in a 1986 amendment, replaced a prior version of the DACCA that had exempted all attorneys from its scope....

Appellate Division Oral Argument of the Week: Where a Party Files a Suit Alleged to Violate the UPEPA But Quickly Dismisses It, Can Defendants Then Get Counsel Fees Under the Statute?

On May 15, judges on Part C of the Appellate Division will hear oral argument in Satz v. Keshet Starr. Plaintiff, acting pro se, filed a defamation suit against defendants. Defendants filed an o order to show cause to dismiss the case and for attorneys' fees under the Uniform Public Expression Protection Act, N.J.S.A. 2A:53A-49 et seq. ("UPEPA"). The UPEPA, enacted in 2023, sought to make it more difficult to use the legal system as a weapon to bully individuals into silence by filing what have been known as SLAPP ("strategic lawsuits against public participation") suits....