Schwartz v. Menas, ___ N.J. ___ (2022). [Disclosure: I argued this case for the successful plaintiffs, having handled the appeal along with co-counsel, Giovanni DePierro of DePierro Radding]. In 1936, the Court of Errors and Appeals decided Weiss v. Revenue Building & Loan Ass’n, 116 N.J.L. 208 (E. & A. 1936). That case held that a new business could never claim lost profits as an element of damages in a lawsuit and established in New Jersey what has been called the “new business rule.” Though the Appellate Division had severely and repeatedly criticized that...

France v. Bernstein, ___ F.4th ___ (3d Cir. 2022). As Judge Jordan said in his opinion for the Third Circuit today, “[i]t’s a steep climb to vacate an arbitration award.” Under the Federal Arbitration Act, 9 U.S.C. 10(a) (“FAA”), there are only four grounds for doing so: “(1) where the award was procured by corruption, fraud, or undue means; (2) where there was evident partiality or corruption in the arbitrators, or either of them; (3) where the arbitrators were guilty of misconduct in refusing to postpone the hearing, upon sufficient cause shown, or in...

The dog days of summer often see the Supreme Court and the Appellate Division issuing opinions in cases argued earlier in the Term. The Third Circuit is often more active than those other courts in issuing opinions during the summer. Here are summaries of some of the published opinions issued by the three courts last week. These include all published opinions, civil and criminal, of the Supreme Court and the Appellate Division, and the lone published civil decision issued by the Third Circuit (without covering several criminal opinions issued by that court last week): East Bay Drywall, LLC...