On July 20, 2012, James Holmes walked into a packed theater in Aurora, Colorado and opened fire on patrons watching a midnight showing of the Batman movie “The Dark Knight Rises.” Holmes killed twelve people and injured another 70, some seriously and for...
I’ve written many times about how trials are crap shoots. Why is this? There are many reasons, but one reason can be implicit bias. We all have them. It is part of being human. In fact, it evolved within us so we can make quick decisions (such as is that...
Update (4/7/2017): The 7th Circuit issues an 8-3 en banc decision reversing the district court ruling dismissing the case. ……. I’ve written previously about the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s (EEOC) attempts to expand existing...
In March, I reported that the EEOC brought its first sexual orientation discrimination cases under Title VII’s prohibition on workplace discrimination based upon sex of the employee. A press release from the EEOC states that one of the case, the one in...
In December, I wrote about a case where a person was fired presumably because he was getting divorced and having an affair with a co-worker. The plaintiff sued under the NJ Law Against Discrimination (LAD), his case was dismissed by the trial court and reverse on...
Today, the New Jersey Supreme Court Issued a decision in Rodriguez v. Raymours Furniture Company, Inc. This is a case of first impression and answers the question whether an employer can contractually limit the filing period for a claim under NJ’s Law Against...
A number of arbitration-related cases have been decided so far this month in the NJ Court system and there is a theme to all of them: whether an arbitration clause in a contract can compel arbitration. Arbitration is where an arbitrator acts as a private judge for...
Traditionally, the “American Rule” has prevailed in New Jersey, meaning each side pays their own legal fees in a lawsuit. (This is contrasted with the “British Rule” where the loser of the litigation pays all fees.) There are public policy...
I mediate many NJ Consumer Fraud Act cases. The state passed the original law in 1960 “‘to combat the increasingly widespread practice of defrauding the consumer” and added a private cause of action in 1971. (A private cause of action means that an...
The U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment Commission is charged with enforcing a number of our federal workplace anti-discrimination laws. Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act sets up a number of “protected classes” (i.e. race, color, religion, sex or...
