On April 23, 2025, Matt Donovan and Viktoriya Liberchuk moderated a panel featuring Westchester Commercial Division Justices Linda S. Jamieson and Gretchen Walsh. The “town-hall” event covered a wide range of topics, including motion practice, artificial intelligence in legal proceedings, alternative dispute resolution, and trial procedures, to name just a few.
Below are some of
Regular visitors to this blog no doubt are aware that the rules of practice for the Commercial Division are centered on innovation, efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and predictability. This includes the rules governing trial and trial preparation (Rules 25-33), which are important enough to merit their own, separate Preamble.
As it stands, the Preamble to Rules 25-33
Here at New York Commercial Division Practice, we make a point of highlighting the advantages of practicing in the Commercial Division. For example, in Have Commercial Dispute, Will Travel (to New York) | New York Commercial Division Practice, we discussed the reasons why practitioners and their clients are (or should be) willing to
I think it’s fair to say that Commercial Division judges have little time for discovery disputes. If one peruses the individual practice rules of many of the ComDiv judges, one typically finds language all but prohibiting discovery motions. And ComDiv Rule 14, which itself provides that “[d]iscovery disputes are preferred to be resolved through court
It’s been a minute since our last installment of our “Check the Rules” series here on New York Commercial Division Practice, in which we occasionally highlight decisions from Commercial Division judges holding litigants and practitioners to account for noncompliance with either the Rules of the Commercial Division or the individual practice rules
As one might gather from the title of this blog, we here at New York Commercial Division Practice try to make a more-than-occasional point of extolling the virtues of the Commercial Division. From its well-established reputation as a sophisticated, cost-effective, predictable, and expeditious forum to its related ability to attract businesses nationwide to litigate their disputes in New York State, when it comes to litigating commercial cases in New York, the Commercial Division is the place to be.
Every year around this time, New York’s Chief Administrative Judge publishes an annual report, which “collect[s], compile[s] and publish[es] statistics and other data with respect to the unified court system and submit[s] annually, on or before the fifteenth day of March, to the legislature and governor a report of activities and the state of the unified court system during the preceding year.” The New York State Unified Court System’s 2023 Annual Report, which was just published last week, devoted a section to the Commercial Division under the heading “A Commitment to Society,” in which the Chief Administrator praised the work of the Commercial Division Advisory Council, which, under the leadership of Robert L. Haig, Esq., has helped develop the Commerical Division into becoming “a recognized leader in court system innovation, … demonstrating an unparalleled creativity and flexibility in [the] development of rules and practices.” Continue Reading The Chief Administrative Judge’s 2023 Annual Report, the State of the Commercial Division, and Other ComDiv Goings-On
As frequent readers of this blog are no doubt aware, the ten-volume practice treatise entitled Commercial Litigation in New York State Courts and edited by distinguished commercial practitioner Robert L. Haig (the “Haig Treatise”) – now in its 5th edition – is an invaluable guide for litigators navigating the inner workings of
A few years back, in a post entitled What the Commercial Division Has Done for Us Lately, we commented on a 2019 report from the Commercial Division Advisory Council, which extolled “The Benefits of the Commercial Division to the State of New York” since its inception in 1995, including how it “has made the
The Commercial Division in Bronx County hasn’t been around all that long, opening its doors for adjudication in September 2019 with its very first case, Manhattan Beer Distributers LLC v Biagio Cru and Estate Wines, LLC. Justice Eddie McShan was the first to preside over the ComDiv in Bronx County and remained in that
It’s no secret to anyone litigating in the Commercial Division over the past couple years during the COVID era that the judges of the Commercial Division have been particularly keen on lightening their dockets by encouraging, and even participating in, the settlement of cases that come before them. That trend is sure to continue in