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• Court Should Have Vacated Note of Issue Because of Changed Circumstances

  On May 13, 2026, the Second Department issued a decision in Harrison v. 160-01 Jamaica Ave. Corp., 2026 NY Slip Op. 02970, holding that a trial court should have vacated a note of issue because of changed circumstances, explaining: [T]he Supreme Court should have granted that branch of Atlantic’s motion which was pursuant to 22...

• Spotlighting Female Genital Mutilation: An Insidious International Human Rights Crisis

  Author: Amanda Janell DeAmor Quest Commonwealth Caribbean Lawyer On August 11, 2025, the BBC reported the death of a one-month-old baby girl who had been subjected to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in the Gambia—a country that is one of 10 countries with the highest rates of FGM despite the practice having been outlawed there since...

• Haifa Smoked Fish recalls products after testing shows Listeria contamination

  Haifa Smoked Fish of Jamaica, NY, is recalling “COLD SMOKED SALMON” and “COLD SMOKED SEABASS” because of positive tests for Listeria monocytogenes.  The implicated Haifa “COLD SMOKED SALMON” is sold in 8-ounce packages with LOT # 219. The “COLD SMOKED SEABASS” is also sold in 8-ounce packages and is marked with LOT # 212. Both...

• Interview with a Probate Lawyer: Brandan J. Pratt

  Brandan J. Pratt of Huth, Pratt & Milhauser in Boca Raton was on the winning side of Markes v. Markes, an interesting 4th DCA appellate opinion I wrote about here involving a contested, multi-jurisdictional estate with contacts in New York, Florida and Jamaica. The 4th DCA ruled in that case that a Florida probate judge...

• From the Bookshelves: Long Island Migrant Labor Camps: Dust for Blood by Mark A. Torres

  Long Island Migrant Labor Camps: Dust for Blood Paperback – March 22, 2021 by Mark A. Torres During World War II, a group of potato farmers opened the first migrant labor camp in Suffolk County to house farmworkers from Jamaica. Over the next twenty years, more than one hundred camps of various sizes would be...

• How to Serve Process in Jamaica

  Squarely in the heart of the Caribbean Sea lies an island that has played host to countless movies, spring break junkets, and movies about spring break junkets.  The mere mention of Jamaica conjures images of Bob Marley, cabanas under palm trees, and scantily clad beachgoers who have escaped the frigid northern winter.  And lots of...

• MSC Meraviglia Security Staff Pepper-Spray Unruly Guests

  Late Thursday night, a brawl erupted on a MSC cruise ship which had been denied permission to dock in several Caribbean ports this week over fears of coronavirus, according to several news outlets. Jamaica and the Cayman Islands blocked the MSC Meraviglia from docking when the ship called on Ocho Rios, Jamaica and later when...

• Four Year Anniversary of Freedom of the Seas Fire

  Four years ago today, Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas caught on fire as it approached the port of Falmouth, Jamaica. A former Royal Caribbean crew member, Kevin Chambers who lives near Falmouth, and who we previously represented, videotaped the blaze. The video below has been viewed on Facebook over 1,200,000 times.   When Royal Caribbean tried to spin...

• CanEx Jamaica 2018: Lessons from Marijuana Legalization Across North America

  I recently traveled to Montego Bay for the annual CanEx Jamaica conference. I spoke on a panel with attorneys from Jamaica and Canada about the legal challenges across international cannabis markets. Grace Lindo of Jamaican firm Nunes, Scholefield, DeLeon & Co. and Sandra Gogal of Canadian firm Miller Thomson LLP, each spoke about the markets in...

• CanEx Jamaica 2018: Lessons from Marijuana Legalization Across North America

  I recently traveled to Montego Bay for the annual CanEx Jamaica conference. I spoke on a panel with attorneys from Jamaica and Canada about the legal challenges across international cannabis markets. Grace Lindo of Jamaican firm Nunes, Scholefield, DeLeon & Co. and Sandra Gogal of Canadian firm Miller Thomson LLP, each spoke about the markets in...

Featured documents

• Cruise Ship Drug Bust in Cayman Islands

  Cayman News Service reports that three crew members were arrested for possession of two kilos of cocaine.  The cruise employees were from St. Vincent and Jamaica.  As is often the case, the local police did not identify the name of the cruise ship or cruise line.  The three cruise ships in port at...

• “Missing” Carnival Cruise Passengers Arrested in Jamaica

  On January 14th I wrote an article about two passengers who arrived in Falmouth, Jamaica on January 12th, and did not return to the Carnival Victory when the cruise ship departed. Local newspapers in Jamaica said the two men “disappeared.”  Carnival’s PR department subsequently contacted me and...

• Haifa Smoked Fish recalls products after testing shows Listeria contamination

  Haifa Smoked Fish of Jamaica, NY, is recalling “COLD SMOKED SALMON” and “COLD SMOKED SEABASS” because of positive tests for Listeria monocytogenes.  The implicated Haifa “COLD SMOKED SALMON” is sold in 8-ounce packages with LOT # 219. The “COLD SMOKED SEABASS” is also sold in 8-ounce packages and...

• Cruise Lines Owe Jamaica More Than $12,000,000 In Unpaid Taxes?

  An interesting editorial appears today in the Jamaica Gleaner about a proposal to increase the head tax on visitors who arrive via air to Jamaica from $10 to $20. The writer characterizes this proposed increase as unfair considering the head tax on cruise passengers is only $2 per person.  These...

• Human Rights in Jamaica

  The International Human Rights Clinic (IHRC) at Loyola Law School is among a number of organizations involved in advocating for Jamaica’s human rights record to be examined for the second time in Geneva by the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Working Group on the Universal Periodic ...

• Spotlighting Female Genital Mutilation: An Insidious International Human Rights Crisis

  Author: Amanda Janell DeAmor Quest Commonwealth Caribbean Lawyer On August 11, 2025, the BBC reported the death of a one-month-old baby girl who had been subjected to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in the Gambia—a country that is one of 10 countries with the highest rates of FGM despite the...

• Cruise Law Visits Montego Bay Jamaica

  I just returned from a three day trip to Montego Bay. My co-counsel, Jonathan Aronson, and I met with several of our clients who were seriously injured while working for Miami based cruise lines and have been languishing in Jamaica after being dumped back at home.  Seeing our clients, in their...

• Cruise Industry Poised to Destroy Cayman Reefs

  The Caymans is the latest island in the Caribbean where the cruise lines are beating their drums for a new multi-million dollar pier to be built for them in order to expand the business of cruising. I saw this same scenario unfold in Falmouth, Jamaica where Royal Caribbean ram-roded a plan to...

• Freedom of the Seas on Fire Near Falmouth, Jamaica

  I have received several calls this morning from friends in Montego Bay and Ocho Rios that the Freedom of the Seas is on fire as it approached the port of Falmouth, Jamaica. I also have friends / former Royal Caribbean crew members in Falmouth who are going to obtain photographs of the blaze on the...

• Will Royal Caribbean Ever Live Up to Its Promises to Falmouth Jamaica?

  Last week I traveled to Jamaica to visit clients in Montego Bay and Ocho Rios.  During our trip, we also attended to some matters in the port town of Falmouth where Royal Caribbean parks its new mega-ships, the Genesis class Oasis of the Seas and the Allure of the Seas.  Falmouth is the capital of...