Do you remember what you had for lunch yesterday? How about 2 weeks ago? How about 10 years ago? Even if you do remember, do you think you could come up with evidence – like witnesses or receipts – to back up your story, or do we just have to take your word for it?
Mark your calendars and plan to join us on October 20 for our annual Fall Legal Reform Conference. This year’s event will be held at Bayer headquarters in Whippany from 8:30AM-1PM.
The news clips from this week make you sort of shake your head in disbelief. But are they really that outrageous when you consider we have numerous state laws explicitly encouraging litigation when other means of dispute resolution would be quicker and more cost effective; poorly drafted statutes invite endless lawsuits over their interpretation; and antiquated policies limit the ability of our state to improve its legal climate?
Certain New Jersey businesses have a hard time appealing verdicts against them because it is simply too expensive to do so. The cost comes not just from the expense of hiring attorneys, but from having to post a bond for the full amount of an adverse verdict before being allowed to appeal. In this day and age, eye-popping jury verdicts are not uncommon, but financial regulations and the nature of certain businesses makes it challenging to get funding for appeal bonds.
Balancing the state budget and funding all of the programs the state thinks are important is not an easy task. Revenue growth is steady, but slow, and we are already one of the highest taxed states in the nation, so there is little room to maneuver.
On February 28, Gov. Christie delivered his eighth and final budget address to a joint session of the legislature, officially kicking off negotiations on the state’s FY 2018 budget. The legislature’s focus for the next few months will essentially be on the budget, as it must be passed by July 1.
A selection of the need-to-know civil justice news for the week of January 14-20.
Our court system shouldn’t have to deal with suits over [...]
A selection of the need-to-know civil justice news for the week of December 3-9.
