Stephen Murray Orlofsky

This case involved an attorney's attempt to file a federal RICO lawsuit based on allegations of medical malpractice that had already been dismissed in state court due to the failure to submit an Affidavit of Merit. The court had previously warned the attorney against pursuing such a claim and issued an order to show cause regarding potential sanctions. The court determined that the attorney, Frank D. Branella, violated Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure by persisting with the action despite these warnings. As a result, the court ordered the attorney to complete continuing legal education courses in federal practice and procedure as well as professionalism and professional conduct rules.

proceduretorts & liability

The case concerns residents of the predominantly minority Waterfront South neighborhood in Camden, New Jersey, who sued the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and related defendants after the agency issued air permits for a cement grinding facility operated by St. Lawrence Cement Co. The plaintiffs alleged intentional discrimination under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and the Equal Protection Clause, discriminatory effects under the Fair Housing Act, and private and public nuisance claims, asserting that the permitting decision disproportionately harmed their already burdened community. The court addressed the defendants' motions to dismiss these remaining claims under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). It granted the motions in part and denied them in part, allowing certain intentional discrimination and Fair Housing Act claims to proceed on the basis of alleged patterns of prior permitting decisions while dismissing other claims for failure to state a viable cause of action.

civil rightsenvironmentproceduretorts & liability

This case involves defendant Tank I. Alsugair, who was charged with conspiracy and mail fraud under federal statutes for allegedly using an imposter to take the TOEFL exam on his behalf and then submitting falsified results to schools. The government claimed this scheme deprived the Educational Testing Service (ETS) of property interests including trademarked and copyrighted test materials, administration services, and goodwill. After previously dismissing an earlier indictment for failing to adequately allege a property deprivation, the court denied the motion to dismiss the superseding indictment. The court reasoned that the new indictment sufficiently alleged that Alsugair obtained specific property from ETS, satisfying the elements of the mail-fraud statute. The decision focused on the facial sufficiency of the indictment's allegations at the pretrial stage without addressing the evidence's strength.

criminal lawproperty

In White v. Camden City Board of Education, plaintiff Rachel White, a substitute teacher born in 1940 who lacked full teaching certification despite multiple applications starting in 1992, sued the Camden County Board of Education under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act alleging that her repeated failures to obtain a permanent teaching position were due to age discrimination. The defendant moved for summary judgment, arguing that White was not qualified for the positions because she never completed required credits for certification and that younger successful applicants possessed the necessary credentials. The court granted summary judgment to the Board after finding no evidence that age played any role in the hiring decisions and that the lack of certification was a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason supported by the record; it denied the accompanying request for Rule 11 sanctions against White's attorney. The decision rested on the absence of any genuine issue of material fact regarding discriminatory intent or pretext.

labor & employmentcivil rights

This case under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) involved an autistic child, S.C., whose parents sought a residential educational placement after determining that his day program at the Bancroft School was inadequate and causing regression. An administrative law judge had previously ruled that the Deptford Township Board of Education failed to provide a free appropriate public education and ordered residential placement, which Deptford resisted and challenged in federal court while seeking contribution from state agencies. The court granted summary judgment to S.C., enforcing the residential placement and holding the local district responsible, while denying reargument by the state defendants but dismissing one agency on Eleventh Amendment grounds. The decision rested on the administrative findings that residential services were necessary for meaningful educational benefit, the district's obligations under IDEA, and limits on state sovereign immunity in this context.

civil rightsfederal powerprocedure

The case concerned whether a Property Settlement Agreement (PSA) from Barbara Smith’s divorce from her ex-husband, a former DuPont employee, qualified as a Qualified Domestic Relations Order (QDRO) under ERISA entitling her to 50% of his pension or death benefits, despite the plan never having received a copy. DuPont denied benefits on the ground that ERISA preempted the state divorce order and required a QDRO submitted to the administrator. The court ruled that the PSA satisfied ERISA’s statutory criteria for a QDRO exempt from preemption, that submission to the plan was not a prerequisite to enforceability, and therefore granted Smith’s motion for summary judgment while denying DuPont’s cross-motion.

family lawlabor & employmentfederal power

This case involved defendant Joseph S. Caruso, who pled guilty to conspiracy to travel in interstate commerce to facilitate a corrupt payment in violation of federal law and a New Jersey statute. Following his guilty plea to a bribery-related conspiracy charge as a former attorney and municipal prosecutor, he was sentenced to three years of probation, including six months of house arrest. Caruso moved for early termination of probation under 18 U.S.C. § 3564(c) after about 21 months, primarily because his New York bar suspension ran concurrently with his probation term, preventing him from reapplying for admission until completion. The court denied the motion after considering the factors in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), concluding that the underlying offense was serious, Caruso's compliance with probation conditions was not extraordinary, and early termination was not justified by the interests of justice or the need for deterrence and respect for the law.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved plaintiff Steven Veneziano bringing claims under the ADA, New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, ERISA, and for intentional infliction of emotional distress against his former employer Long Island Pipe Fabrication, Robert Moss, and insurer Aetna U.S. Healthcare, based on alleged disability-related termination of benefits and employment actions. After the court granted summary judgment dismissing all claims against Aetna and most claims against the other defendants (with the ERISA claim proceeding to trial), Aetna and the others moved for attorneys' fees as prevailing parties. The court held that Aetna was entitled to recover its reasonable fees and costs from plaintiff's counsel Diana Andreacchio personally under 28 U.S.C. § 1927, because she had unreasonably and vexatiously multiplied the proceedings in bad faith by pursuing frivolous ADA and LAD claims against Aetna, but no fee-shifting was ordered against Long Island Pipe or Moss.

civil rightsprocedure

This case involved defendant Micah Clark's motion to suppress evidence obtained by the FBI from two Philadelphia hotel rooms registered in his name, after he was indicted for the armed robbery of a New Jersey bank. The searches were conducted based on consent forms signed by Mohammed Jah, who stated he had a key and had been staying in one room, and by an overnight guest named Hall in the other room. The court denied the motion to suppress, concluding that the consenting parties had sufficient apparent authority to permit the searches under the Fourth Amendment.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved a long-term franchisee distributor of General Motors AC Delco auto parts who challenged GM's new Direct Distribution Group plan that would restrict sales to a limited geographic area and cause an estimated forty percent loss of revenue. After expedited discovery and a hearing, the district court granted the franchisee's motion for a preliminary injunction preventing GM from enforcing the new plan's restrictions. The court found that the New Jersey Franchise Practices Act was enacted to shield franchisees with lesser bargaining power from such arrangements, which it likened to a Hobson's choice of accepting severe limits or losing the franchise relationship entirely after twenty-three years. The decision rested on the Act's purpose to prevent franchisors from imposing terms that undermine the franchisee's business without real alternatives.

business & regulatory

The case involved a dispute over liability for environmental contamination on commercial property that New West purchased from Westinghouse (Viacom's predecessor) in 1983, with claims brought under CERCLA, contract, and tort theories after prior related litigation in 1994. Viacom moved for partial summary judgment on most counts, asserting that the claims were barred by New Jersey's six-year statute of limitations. The court granted the motion, holding that the discovery rule did not toll the limitations period. The core reasoning was that New West received environmental reports in 1987 identifying areas of concern and potential cleanup costs approaching $500,000, providing sufficient notice to start the clock, yet it delayed filing or pursuing the claims for at least seven years.

environmentpropertyproceduretorts & liability

In this case, plaintiff Steven Beilowitz sued General Motors under the New Jersey Franchise Practices Act, alleging that GM's Dedicated Distribution Agreement with sellers of AC Delco parts would destroy his business. GM moved to disqualify Pepper Hamilton LLP, one of plaintiff's law firms, on the ground that the firm also represented Urban Science, Inc., GM's intended fact and expert witness, creating a conflict under the New Jersey Rules of Professional Conduct. The court denied the motion, concluding that Pepper Hamilton's representation of Beilowitz did not present a disqualifying conflict because the firm had withdrawn from representing Urban Science regarding the subpoena served in the case and the dual representations would not adversely affect either client.

procedurebusiness & regulatory

David Wright sued his former employer L-3 Communications Corporation for age discrimination under the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination after being terminated at age 60. L-3 moved for summary judgment, prompting the court to determine the fourth element of a prima facie age discrimination case under state law. The court held that a plaintiff need only show that the employer sought others to perform the same work after termination, rather than requiring proof that a sufficiently younger person replaced the plaintiff. Finding that Wright had established a prima facie case and raised genuine issues of material fact regarding whether L-3's stated reason for termination was pretextual, the court denied the motion for summary judgment.

labor & employmentcivil rights

Two former inmates at the Camden County Correctional Facility sued the facility's warden and a county freeholder under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that multiple conditions of confinement violated their Eighth Amendment rights. The complained-of conditions included sleeping on thin mattresses on cell floors, inadequate bedding and storage, dirty food trays and spoiled food, fungus-covered showers causing rashes, inadequate medical care, limited law library access, extended lockdowns, and having to sleep next to toilets where urine splashing occurred. The court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment on all claims except one, finding no genuine issues of material fact or failure to meet constitutional standards for the other allegations. It denied summary judgment only on the claim that the toileting conditions led to inmate violence, determining that this allegation raised a triable factual dispute under the applicable deliberate-indifference framework.

criminal lawcivil rights

The case involved federal criminal charges against two foreign students for allegedly having imposters take the TOEFL exam on their behalf and then mailing falsified results to universities, in violation of the mail fraud statute (18 U.S.C. § 1341) and conspiracy. The defendants moved to dismiss the indictments, arguing that the government's theory—that ETS was deprived of an interest in the integrity of its testing process—did not allege a cognizable property interest under the statute. The court granted the motions, holding that the mail fraud statute requires deprivation of traditional property and that ETS's asserted interest in testing integrity fell outside that scope. The decision rested on statutory interpretation precedents requiring the facts alleged to satisfy the elements of the offense, rather than on the sufficiency of evidence.

criminal law

The case involves Dr. Andrew DeSanto, a former temporary faculty member at Rowan University from 1994 to 1998, who sued the university and a dean for employment discrimination based on age, race, gender, and national origin after not being hired for permanent positions in 1998, asserting claims under federal civil rights statutes, Title VII, the ADEA, and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination. Prior summary judgment rulings had dismissed claims under §§ 1981, 1983, and 1985, national origin claims, and all claims based on conduct before August 20, 1997, while finding no entitlement to tenure under state law and leaving questions of material fact on age, gender, and race discrimination. In this opinion addressing pretrial motions in limine, the court precluded evidence or equitable relief regarding entitlement to tenure or a tenured position, consistent with the earlier dismissal of due process claims, but permitted limited evidence of representations about tenure if relevant to proving intentional discrimination; it also issued rulings on the admissibility of various witnesses, documents, and evidence related to damages and punitive damages for the remaining claims. The core reasoning relied on the binding effect of the prior summary judgment order, the requirements of the Federal Rules of Evidence, and the principle that remedies should not place the plaintiff in a better position than absent the alleged discrimination.

civil rightslabor & employment

In this case, Microsoft sought attorneys’ fees and costs after prevailing in a civil contempt action against defendants who violated two permanent injunctions by distributing counterfeit Microsoft software. The court had previously found the defendants in contempt and ordered them to pay Microsoft $158,750 in sanctions. Microsoft requested $252,476.25 in fees plus $63,064.34 in costs, but the court reduced the fees to $141,745.68, citing duplication of effort and overstaffing, while awarding the full costs for a total of $204,810.02. The court applied the lodestar method to determine reasonable fees and emphasized that awards must relate to the relief obtained and that excessive fees are not permitted under the court’s inherent powers or professional conduct rules.

procedurebusiness & regulatory

This case is a long-running commercial dispute in which Lithuanian Commerce Corporation sued Sara Lee Hosiery for legal fraud and breach of express warranty arising from the sale of Mexican-made pantyhose. The court held that New Jersey law requires legal fraud to be proven by clear and convincing evidence, following the state supreme court's decision in Gennari v. Weichert Co. Realtors and subsequent Third Circuit authority that superseded earlier circuit precedent applying the preponderance standard. The court further ruled that, under N.J. Stat. Ann. § 12A:2-313, a seller's statements about the value of goods cannot create an express warranty, and therefore removed related language from the jury charge on that claim.

business & regulatoryproceduretorts & liability

This case under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) involved a dispute over funding for a residential educational placement for an autistic child, S.C., after his parents successfully challenged the local school district's (Deptford Township Board of Education) proposed individual education plan in a due process hearing. The school district then sued New Jersey state agencies, including the Department of Education and the Division of Developmental Disabilities, seeking reimbursement for the costs of providing the required free appropriate public education. The court held that the IDEA creates a private right of action allowing the local district to sue the state agencies and that those agencies must bear financial responsibility for certain services before the local district does, based on the statute's requirements for interagency agreements and coordination to ensure services are provided at no cost to parents or local districts. The court granted in part and denied in part the state agencies' motion to dismiss, finding the district had standing for most but not all claims. The decision focused on the clear text of 20 U.S.C. § 1412(a)(12) mandating state-level financial responsibility.

civil rightsfederal power

In this commercial dispute, Lithuanian Commerce Corp. sued Sara Lee Hosiery over alleged breaches related to a settlement agreement involving the sale of pantyhose, asserting claims including breach of contract, warranties under the UCC, common law fraud, and violation of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing. At the close of the plaintiff's case in the retrial, the court considered Sara Lee's motion for judgment as a matter of law on multiple grounds. The court granted the motion solely on the claim for breach of the implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose due to lack of evidence of a specialized use, but denied it on all other claims, finding sufficient evidence for the jury to consider issues like damages, fraud, and bad faith without improperly weighing the evidence itself.

business & regulatoryproceduretorts & liability