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

A New COAH Abolition Appeal for the Supreme Court

On July 6, 2012, the Supreme Court granted review of In re Plan for the Abolition of the Council on Affordable Housing, 424 N.J. Super. 410 (App. Div. 2012), a...

Girls in Little League

On this date in 1974, with a one-sentence summary affirmance of the Appellate Division, the Supreme Court upheld a ruling that Little League Baseball, Inc. had to admit girls aged...

The Supreme Court of New Jersey Takes Up an Arbitration Case

The Supreme Court of the United States has been very active in granting review of cases seeking to compel arbitration in various contexts. Now, the Supreme Court of New Jersey...

The Supreme Court Goes Mobile

The Supreme Court of New Jersey announced yesterday that webcasts of archived Supreme Court oral arguments can now be viewed in an MP4 format, on notepads, smart phones, or other...

Adverse Ruling by Civil Service Commission Precluded Employee From Bringing CEPA Lawsuit

Winters v. North Hudson Regional Fire & Rescue, 212 N.J. 67 (2012). When a public employee who is the subject of a disciplinary proceeding before the Civil Service Commission ("the...

Tea Party Challenge to District Map Fails

Gonzalez v. State of New Jersey Apportionment Comm'n, ___ N.J. Super. ___ (App. Div. 2012). The Tea Party has had little electoral success in New Jersey. Its efforts to achieve...

Chief Justice Rabner Elevates Judges Rodriguez and Cuff to the Supreme Court

In an Order issued yesterday, Chief Justice Rabner announced the elevation of Judges Rodriguez and Cuff to the Supreme Court effective October 1, 2012. The Chief Justice acted pursuant to...

The Printing Mart Decision

The end of August is usually a relatively sleepy period in terms of Supreme Court decisions. On this date in 1989, however, the Supreme Court issued its decision in Printing...

Ten Years Since Lonegan I

On this date in 2002, the Supreme Court of New Jersey decided Lonegan v. State, 174 N.J. 435 (2002). There, plaintiffs mounted a challenge to numerous types of state "contract debt"...

A Lesson in Collateral Estoppel, and an Appellate Practice Nugget

Gannon v. American Home Products, Inc., 211 N.J. 454 (2012). This case presented the issue of whether a judgment against these personal injury plaintiffs in their federal court suit against the...

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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....