Tackling the Interplay of the Web and the Long-Arm Statute, among Other Issues

Abstract

This article discusses four significant opinions handed down by the New York Court of Appeals during its 2011–2012 term that resolved important issues pertaining to the application of four CPLR provisions: In Simon v. Usher, 17 N.Y.3d 625 (2011), the Court concluded that CPLR 2103(b)(2)’s five-day extension for service of a paper by mail is triggered when a defendant serves its demand to change venue by mail, and then subsequently moves to change venue. The Court, in Cadichon v. Facelle, 18 N.Y.3d 230 (2011), was tasked with interpreting the parameters of CPLR 3216, which allows a court to dismiss, sua sponte, a party’s pleading for the party’s failure to timely serve and file a note of issue. CPLR 217’s four-month statute of limitations, which begins to run the moment that an administrative decision becomes “final and binding,” arrived before the Court in Kahn v. NYC Dept. of Educ., 18 N.Y.3d 457 (2012) in the context of an Article 78 proceeding challenging the termination of plaintiffs’ probationary employment at the City of New York’s Department of Education, with bad news for the plaintiffs. The Court, once again, in SPCA of Upstate New York v. Am. Working Collie Ass’n, 18 N.Y.3d 400 (2012), undertook the task of defining the contours of New York’s long-arm statute, CPLR 302, in the context of an action involving defamatory statements made on the Web. The eventual holding highlighted the Court’s discord, which has been demonstrated by several split decisions such as this one.