ALBANY – For the first time in a decade, outside judges joined the Court of Appeals for an oral argument yesterday so that the Court could muster a majority in a dispute over the liability of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for the 1993 terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center.
Both Justices A. Gail Prudenti, presiding justice of the Appellate Division, Second Department, and Thomas E. Mercure, acting presiding justice of the Third Department, asked numerous questions of the litigants’ lawyers during the 50 minutes the Court allotted for discussion of Matter of World Trade Center Bombing Litigation Steering Committee v. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, 217.
