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

Senate Bill Would Create Title of "Acting Justice"

By a 22-16 vote, the Senate passed and sent to the Assembly a bill known as S-2515. An identical bill, A-3269, has been introduced in the Assembly. That legislation would...

Rutgers Violated Open Public Meetings Act in Some Respects, But That Statute Gave Plaintiff No Remedy

McGovern v. Rutgers, The State University, 211 N.J. 94 (2012). Plaintiff complained that the Board of Governors of Rutgers, The State University, violated the Open Public Meetings Act, N.J.S.A. 10:4-6...

Can an Insurer, Suspicious of Insurance Fraud, Require Health Providers Who Seek Reimbursement from the Insurer, to Supply Information About Their Ownership Structure and Billing Practices?

Selective Ins. Co. v. Hudson East Pain Management, 210 N.J. 597 (2012). Defendants provided medical treatment to patients who had personal injury protection ("PIP") insurance through plaintiff ("Selective"). The patients assigned their right to...

Seton Hall Law School Women's Law Forum Honors Judge Wefing

Tonight, I was privileged to attend an event at which the Seton Hall Law School's Women's Law Forum honored Judge Wefing with its "Women of Substance" award. Approximately 150 people...

Judge Wefing Replaces Judge Stern on the Supreme Court

Today, Judge Stern reached the mandatory retirement age of 70. Accordingly, Chief Justice Rabner appointed Judge Wefing, the Presiding Judge of the Appellate Division, to the seat that Judge Stern...

Party On? "Parties" to a Contract Are Only Those Who Have Signed It

YA Global Investments, L.P. v. Cliff, 419 N.J. Super. 1 (App. Div. 2011). This is a personal jurisdiction case. But it is not the usual circumstance, where a plaintiff asserts jurisdiction based on...

Four New Criminal Appeals, and a Lone Civil Matter, for the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court announced that it has granted review in five new appeals. Four of them are criminal cases and one is a civil appeal....

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....

"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....