THE NEW JERSEY ORDER AND JUDGMENT SHOULD HAVE BEEN ACCORDED FULL FAITH AND CREDIT IN THE NEW YORK FORECLOSURE ACTION; CRITERIA EXPLAINED (THIRD DEPT).
The Third Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined a New Jersey order and judgment should have been accorded full faith and credit in this foreclosure action:
“A judgment rendered by a court of a sister State is accorded ‘the same credit, validity, and effect, in every other court of the United States, which it had in the state where it was pronounced’ ” … . Our review of the foreign judgment at issue is “limited to determining whether the rendering court had jurisdiction” … . It is undisputed that the New Jersey court had jurisdiction as the defendants appeared in the action and vigorously litigated the matter for years, thus, “inquiry into the merits of the underlying dispute is foreclosed” … and “the merits of [the] judgment of a sister state may not be collaterally attacked” … . Accordingly, a “decree of a sister [s]tate in which [the] parties were subject to personal jurisdiction in that [s]tate is entitled to full faith and credit in the courts of New York” … . Sjogren v Land Assoc., LLC, 2024 NY Slip Op 00009, Third Dept 1-4-24
Practice Point: A New York court’s only function in determining whether a foreign state’s order and judgment should be accorded full faith and credit is assessing whether the foreign court had jurisdiction over the matter.