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

An Interesting Case About Interest

State by Commissioner of Transportation v. St. Mary's Church Gloucester, 464 N.J. Super. 579 (App. Div. 2020). This appeal was about how to calculate interest on a portion of a...

A Dead Person Cannot Bring Suit

Repko v. Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center, Inc., 464 N.J. Super. 570 (App. Div. 2020). Judge Accurso's brief opinion in this case today addressed a "question [that] appears to...

Powering Up Again

The power outage resulting from last week's storm put a crimp in much of that week. So it is time once again to catch up with our Supreme Court and...

A Lesson About Class Counsel's Attorneys' Fees From Judge Gooden Brown

Seigelstein v. Shrewsbury Motors, Inc., 464 N.J. Super. 393 (App. Div. 2020). When class action cases settle with a benefit to the class, class counsel, who normally handle those cases...

Consumer Fraud Act and Product Liability Act Claims Can Co-Exist

Sun Chemical Corp. v. Fike Corp., 243 N.J. 319 (2020). This opinion by Justice Solomon today resolved another question (originally, multiple questions, but reformulated into a single question by the...

Municipal Special Assessment Invalid Where Expert Report on Which it Was Premised Lacked a Rational Basis

Crispino v. Sparta Tp., 243 N.J. 234 (2020). By statute, the Legislature has delegated to municipalities the power to impose special assessments on property owners to fund improvements that benefit...

Entire Controversy Doctrine Does Not Bar Second Case Brought by Party Who, as a Defendant, Defeated a Prior Case for Failure to State a Claim

Bank Leumi USA v. Kloss, 243 N.J. 218 (2020). As discussed here, this was a case involving a certified question from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, and for the...

Board of Education Lacked MLUL Standing Where Its Challenge to Development Approvals Was Based Only on Potential Increased Crowding of Schools

Edison Bd. of Educ. v. Zoning Bd. of Adj. of Edison., 464 N.J. Super. 298 (2020). This opinion by Judge Messano today affirmed a Law Division ruing that the Edison...

Two More for the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court announced today that it has granted review in two new cases. In one case, the Court granted certification. In the other, there was a dissent in the...

New Jersey Arbitration Act Applies Automatically to Contracts Exempt From Federal Arbitration Act

Arafa v. Health Express Corp., 243 N.J. 147 (2020). Justice Fernandez-Vina's opinion today actually involved two consolidated cases, both of which were putative class actions. The issue was whether a...

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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....