According to the New York State Unified Court System’s 2017 Annual Report, during 2017 the four departments of the Appellate Division disposed of 9,569 appeals after argument or submission. The odds of obtaining a reversal or modification were 25 percent. Disappointed appellants will find comfort in the Court of Appeals’ reversal rate: 33 percent of the 142 appeals decided by New York’s highest court in 2017 resulted in a reversal. Not bad! This shows that our appellate courts are hard at work—and not just rubber stamps. We highlight some of the Appellate Division’s closely watched cases—including a number of reversals—from the first quarter of 2018.

First Department

Defamation. Falsely alleging that someone has a “loathsome disease”—one that is “contagious [or] attributed in any way to socially repugnant conduct”—may constitute defamation per se. In light of today’s societal views, does HIV qualify as a “loathsome disease”? In Nolan v. State of New York, 2018 N.Y. Slip Op. 00269 (1st Dept. Jan. 16, 2018), the First Department concluded that it does.