How the Recession Has Complicated Judgments By Confession

As New York Times reporter William Glaberson recently reported in his Dec. 29, 2009 article, “The Recession Begins Flooding Into the Courts,” New York State courts closed the year with 4.7 million cases, the highest tally ever. This is one of many signs that our country's recession has made itself a home in the judicial system. The increase in court activity has affected various branches of the New York State court system. The Clerk of New York County's Judgments Office has witnessed a dramatic increase in volume and complexity of cases, as attorneys in greater numbers have pursued judgments by confession in an effort to avoid litigation. In many instances, however, attorneys have been frustrated to find that a judgment by confession is not the proper procedural tool under the circumstances. In ordinary economic times, the most common deficiency in applications for judgment by confession is the failure to include sufficient detail concerning the basis for a judgment. Recently, however, the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction, the judgment clerk says. Instead of providing insufficient detail, attorneys have been filing exceedingly complex applications based on sophisticated and voluminous commercial transactions, many of which have been denied because, in short, they are too complicated.