Theodore Botter, an Appellate Division judge who was best known for a landmark decision that he issued as a trial judge, died on June 22, according to an obituary published yesterday. Having done his undergraduate work at Ohio State and Brown University, he got his law degree from the Columbia University School of Law in 1949. After an initial period of time in private practice, Judge Botter joined the Office of the New Jersey Attorney General, where he thereafter rose to the position of First Assistant Attorney General. He was appointed to the Superior Court bench in 1964 and promoted to...

Estate of Campagna v. Pleasant Point Properties, LLC, ___ N.J. Super. ___ (App. Div. 2020). This opinion is a magnum opus by Judge Sabatino. But he well summarized the ruling in the three short paragraphs that began the opinion: “This wrongful death and survival case arises out of the fatal stabbing of a rooming house resident by another resident. The assailant had recently been released from prison after serving a sentence for a violent crime, although the rooming house owner and operator were not aware of that criminal history. “The core question in this case is whether, under...

Due to a personal matter, there have been no posts on this blog since June 2. This post will summarize some of the decisions from our appellate courts since that date. Separately, Governor Murphy nominated Fabiana Pierre-Louis to fill the Supreme Court seat currently held by Justice Timpone when he reaches retirement age in November of this year. A separate post, on another day, will discuss that nomination. Finally, the Supreme Court granted certification in one new case, Haley v. Board of Review. The question presented there, as phrased by the Supreme Court Clerk’s office, is...