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Showing posts from September, 2007

NJ Foreclosure Ruling - Final Judgment Merges Mortgage

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In a case that merits attention by banks and lawyers practicing debtor and creditors' rights, the Chancery Division in Middlesex County held that upon satisfaction of a final judgment of foreclosure a mortgagor is entitled to receive only a warrant of satisfaction of judgment, not a discharge of the mortgage in the County recording office. Washington Mutual, FA v. Wroblewski , F-1865-05. In this case, the bank sought reconsideration of an order issued by the Chancery Court requiring that it provide a discharge of mortgage to the defendant mortgagor based on the mortgagor's satisfaction/payment of the final judgment of foreclosure. The applicable statute, N.J.S.A. 2A:50-32 provides that when a judgment of foreclosure is satisfied, a warrant of satisfaction shall be entered. The defendants argued that upon satisfaction of a final judgment of foreclosure the lender should no longer have a claim for monies due and the mortgage should therefore be discharged. The bank's counter

NJ Supreme Court Issues Significant Ruling in Medical Malpractice Case Involving Termination of Pregnancy

September 12, 2007 In this case, the New Jersey Supreme Court was faced with the difficult question of determining whether a physician is required to inform a patient, who was in the 6th to 8th week of her pregnancy, that an abortion procedure will kill not just potential life, but an actual existing human being. In this case, the plaintiff filed a medical malpractice action claiming that her physician, an obstetrician-gynecologist, performed an abortion without her informed consent. Specifically, the plaintiff alleged in her Complaint that the doctor breached his duty to her by failing to inform her of "the scientific and medical fact [that her six-to-eight-week-old embryo] was a complete, separate, unique, and irreplaceable human being" and that an abortion would result in "killing an existing human being." In finding in favor of the doctor, the New Jersey Supreme Court concluded that there is no common law duty requiring a physician to inform a pregnant patient t