Berkeley Heights Attorney Takes Fight to the Supreme Court

A local attorney has successfully argued a case before the U.S. Supreme Court that would allow individuals to file class action suits against a company even if a signed contract between the two demands that all disputes go to arbitration instead.

Berkeley Heights attorney Eric D. Katz was arguing his first case before the Supreme Court and won a unanimous 9-0 decision, according to the Independent Press. 

Katz began working on the case in 2002, filing a suit in Superior Court on behalf of his client, John Ivan Sutter, a Clifton-based pediatrician. Katz argued that the arbitration provision in his client’s contract with Oxford Health Plans was invalid, the report said.

Eventually the case made it all the way to the Supreme Court.

The justices upheld the rights of physicians to arbitrate their claims of improper claims processing against Oxford Health Plans.