Chief Justice Rabner has issued the General Assignment Order for the coming Term. It is available here. At the Appellate Division level, the headline is that the number of Parts has been reduced from eight to seven, encompassing a total of thirty judges. Two of the Parts, Parts C and E, have five judges, while the other Parts have four judges, as in the past. Unlike in several past years, there is no provision for any “Temporary Assignees” on any Part. That is despite the fact that the thirty-judge composition of the Appellate Division for 2021-22 is smaller than the...

The power outage resulting from last week’s storm put a crimp in much of that week. So it is time once again to catch up with our Supreme Court and Appellate Division, each of whom took highly consequential actions during that time. Some of those are summarized below. State v. G.E.P., 243 N.J. 362 (2020). This case (actually, four consolidated cases) addressed whether and to what extent the Court’s decision in State v. J.L.G., 234 N.J. 265 (2018), should apply retroactively. In J.L.G., the Court “reassessed” its prior decision in State v. J.Q., 130 N.J. 554 (1993),...

Chief Justice Rabner has issued the General Assignment Order for 2020-21, which is available here. Judge Ostrer has replaced Judge Koblitz, who will be retiring, as Presiding Judge of Part C. The other Presiding Judges, who include Judges Sabatino, Fasciale, Alvarez, Messano, Fisher, Yannotti, and Fuentes, remain in place. Judge Messano continues as Presiding Judge for Administration, as does Judge Sabatino as Deputy Presiding Judge for Administration. The eight panels have been rejiggered, as is the case every year. Parts E and F list “TEMPORARY ASSIGNEE” as their fourth member....