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

Public Notice of Ordinance Rezoning Former General Motors Linden Plant is Held Insufficient

Rockaway Shoprite Associates, Inc. v. City of Linden, 424 N.J. Super. 337 (App. Div. 2011). For many years, a large General Motors assembly plant occupied a 47.5 acre site in...

38 Years Since Fablok Mills

New Jersey caselaw under the Uniform Commercial Code is relatively undeveloped compared to New York's decisional law. On this date in 1973, however, the Appellate Division issued one of New...

The Third Circuit Adopts Concepcion and Finds Muhammad Superseded By It

Litman v. Cellco Partnership, 655 F.3d 225 (3d Cir. 2011). In AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, 131 S. Ct. 1740 (2011), a 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court of the United States rejected...

Oral Settlement Agreement Reached During Mediation May be Enforced

Willingboro Mall, Ltd. v. 240/242 Franklin Avenue, LLC, 421 N.J. Super. 445 (App. Div. 2011). Normally, any settlement, even an oral settlement agreement, can be enforced. The question in this case was...

Independent of AT&T v. Concepcion, Arbitration Clauses in Consumer Contract Are Ineffective If They Conflict With Each Other

NAACP of Camden County East v. Foulke Management Corp., 421 N.J. Super. 404 (App. Div. 2011). This consumer class action was the occasion for another typically scholarly opinion by Judge Sabatino. Geraldine...

Party Does Not Waive Arbitration Clause by Entering Into Mediation

Frumer v. Nat'l Home Ins. Co., 420 N.J. Super. 7 (App. Div. 2011). This short opinion by Judge Simonelli, which involved claims under a new home warranty, reverses a lower court's refusal to...

A Poor Judicial Product and a Disaster for Consumer Protection: A Lengthy Analysis of AT&T v. Concepcion

AT&T Mobility, LLC v. Concepcion, 131 S. Ct. 1740 (2011). From the same people who brought us the outrageous 5-4 decision in Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., 550 U.S....

A Third Circuit Debate About Waiver (or Forfeiture) of Arguments Not Raised Below

Tri-M Group, LLC v. Sharp, 638 F.3d 406 (3d Cir. 2011). In this case, the Third Circuit affirmed a district court ruling that Delaware's Prevailing Wage Regulations unlawfully discriminated against out-of-state contractors,...

"No Counterclaims" Clause in Loan Agreement is Invalid

Investors Savings Bank v. Waldo Jersey City LLP, 418 N.J. Super. 149 (App. Div. 2011). A loan agreement provided that all documents relating to the loan were legal, valid, binding and enforceable,...

No Waiver Even Though Argument Was Not Raised Below

Barefoot Architect, Inc. v. Bunge, 632 F.3d 822 (3d Cir. 2011). This was a group of appeals in a Virgin Islands case that involved, among other things, copyright, Lanham Act, and common...

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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....