 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Employee Leasing Services in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
Riding v. Towne Mills Craft Centre1/29/2001
Argued October 10, 2000
On appeal from the Superior Court, Appellate Division.
This appeal presents the question whether a successful age discrimination plaintiff, when seeking confirmation of an arbitrator's award, may move for counsel fees pursuant to N.J.S.A. 10:5-27.1, the fee-shifting provision of the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination (LAD), N.J.S.A. 10:5-1 to -42. Despite plaintiff's failure to raise her claim for counsel fees during the arbitration or before the time either party could reject the award and request a trial de novo, a majority of the Appellate Division held in an unpublished opinion that the counsel fees request may be heard in a post-arbitration application to the trial court. The appeal is before the Court on the basis of the dissent below.
I.
In 1997, plaintiff Anne Riding filed a complaint alleging age discrimination under the LAD against Towne Mills Craft Centre, Inc. and William Bavin. Bavin has since been dismissed from the action. Among the prayers for relief in Riding's Complaint was a claim for counsel fees. The case was selected for non-binding arbitration under Rule 4:21A-1 pursuant to a pilot program operating in Somerset County. In her Arbitration Statement of the Case, plaintiff sought a total of $57,404.52 in various forms of damages. It is undisputed that neither in that Statement nor at any time during the arbitration did plaintiff or defendant raise the issue of counsel fees.
An arbitrator found in favor of plaintiff and awarded damages in the amount of $38,240. No mention was made of counsel fees in the arbitration award. Before the fiftieth day following the arbitrator's award, plaintiff moved to confirm the award and requested counsel fees and costs in the amount of $9,743.78. Defendant did not contest the confirmation but did oppose the request for fees, contending that because the issue was not placed before the arbitrator plaintiff's application was actually an attempt to modify the award beyond the thirty-day time frame for modification provided in Rule 4:21A-6.
The trial court confirmed the award but denied the fees, holding that plaintiff's application constituted an impermissible request for modification. Plaintiff appealed, contending that the request for fees was not a modification but merely an application for fee shifting under the LAD, to which she was entitled as a matter of law. N.J.S.A. 10:5-27.1
A divided panel of the Appellate Division reversed. Citing the remedial nature of the LAD and the importance of fee shifting in discrimination suits, the Appellate Division held that plaintiff was a "prevailing party" entitled as a matter of law to counsel fees absent special circumstances to the contrary. The majority did not agree with the trial court's implicit holding that plaintiff waived fees by not raising the issue with the arbitrator. The Appellate Division analogized to federal case law allowing a statutory fee application to be made after settlement of a discrimination action, notwithstanding the settlement's silence on the issue. The Appellate Division majority held that there was no waiver of the statutory counsel fees here, and allowed the application to be made to the trial court after confirmation of the arbitration award.
The dissenting member of the panel asserted that the majority's holding thwarted the salutary policies underlying the arbitration process. Noting that the purpose of arbitration is to save judicial resources and promote the efficient, speedy, and inexpensive adjudication of disputes, the dissent stated that the majority opinion contravened those goals in two ways. First, a defendant cannot know whether to accept or rejec
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 New Jersey Employee Leasing Services
Employee Leasing Services
|
| |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Employee Leasing Services in your area.
|
|