For years, Toms River Township officials have been fighting a major federal lawsuit accusing the Township of discriminating against Orthodox Jews seeking to build shuls.
And for years, as the lawsuit dragged on, Township officials have seemingly done everything possible to keep their faces — and their records — hidden from the litigation.
Court orders came.
Deadlines came.
Extensions came.
A contempt order came.
Still, the discovery was not completed.
Now, a federal judge appears to have had enough.
In a blistering new 14-page decision, United States Magistrate Judge Justin T. Quinn has certified the Township's conduct to a United States District Judge for consideration of civil contempt and recommended imposing an extraordinary $20,000-per-day fine for as long as 30 days if Toms River does not finally comply with its discovery obligations.
That potentially means $600,000 in additional sanctions.
And even that may not be the end of it.
Judge Quinn further recommended that if the Township remains noncompliant after those 30 days, the plaintiffs be permitted to move to strike the Township's Answers — a potentially devastating litigation consequence that could dramatically alter the course of the lawsuits.
The decision is the latest — and by far one of the most serious — developments in litigation that FAA News has been following for years.
As previously reported by FAA News, Bais Brucha Inc. and Rabbi Mordechai Sekula, and Khal Anshei Tallymawr Inc. have filed lawsuits against Toms River Township after being denied approval to construct shuls.
The plaintiffs contend that Toms River's land-use regulations and treatment of their applications were part of discriminatory treatment directed at Orthodox Jewish religious land uses.
The litigation did not arise in a vacuum.
The United States Department of Justice had previously investigated Toms River's zoning regulations governing religious assemblies, ultimately resulting in a 2021 consent order requiring the Township to amend its land-use regulations.
The federal lawsuits, however, continued — including claims seeking damages for the Township's prior conduct.
And that meant something Township officials apparently could not avoid forever:
Discovery.
The plaintiffs were entitled to seek the Township's internal documents and electronically stored information to find out what actually happened behind the scenes.
That process has turned into a years-long legal battle of its own.
By March 2025, Judge Quinn was already using extraordinary language to describe what was happening.
More than four years into the litigation, the Court wrote that Toms River still had not produced complete discovery responses despite multiple court orders and extensions.
“Each deadline was missed,” the Court wrote.
The situation, Judge Quinn concluded, was “inexcusable” and “sanctionable.”
And so, in March 2025, the Court formally held Toms River Township and its Zoning Board in contempt of court.
Judge Quinn noted that the Court had already permitted more than ten extensions and warned that at some point the Township's conduct became an “abuse of the Courts' courtesies.”
The Township was given another 60 days to finish the job.
It didn't.
The Court subsequently ordered the Township to pay $29,750 in attorneys' fees resulting from the discovery fight.
Still, the discovery problems continued.
Even after the contempt finding, the Court kept giving Toms River opportunities to clean up the mess.
In August 2025, the Township represented that its outstanding document production and privilege log would be completed within 60 days.
The Court set an October 27, 2025 deadline.
The Township missed it.
Then, on November 26, 2025, Judge Quinn deferred additional sanctions yet again and gave Toms River what the Court expressly called “one final chance” to complete its production by December 31.
That didn't resolve things either.
By July 2026 — more than two years after the original discovery order — production was still incomplete.
And Judge Quinn was now openly discussing stronger sanctions.
The Court explained that it hoped a daily fine might finally convince the municipality of the seriousness of what Judge Quinn called its:
“habitual and flagrant disregard of this Court's decisions.”
Those aren't the words of FAA News.
Those are the words of the federal court.
AND THEN THE COURT WENT LOOKING FOR THE MAYOR'S DEVICES
The discovery battle eventually reached all the way to the Mayor's office.
On July 1, 2026, Judge Quinn entered a separate order requiring Toms River Mayor Daniel Rodrick to provide his Township-issued devices for discovery within two weeks.
But what the Court subsequently learned about Township-issued devices generally is perhaps the most startling part of the new decision.
According to Judge Quinn, numerous Township-issued devices cannot even be located.
In many instances, the Township apparently maintained no records showing when devices were issued, when they were returned, or where they are now.
Some devices had been wiped clean.
Others had undergone factory resets.
Others could not be accessed because of passwords, encryption or missing recovery keys.
And then comes perhaps the most damaging finding of all.
According to the Court, some devices remain unsearched because Toms River simply refused to authorize the forensic work — and expense — necessary to access them.
Judge Quinn therefore rejected the notion that the continuing problems could simply be written off as technological difficulties outside the Township's control.
After repeated orders, extensions and prior sanctions, the Court found, substantial portions of potentially relevant electronic information are now:
“lost, wiped, reset, inaccessible, or unsearched.”
For Township officials who have spent years fighting allegations about what was happening behind closed doors, that is an extraordinary place for this litigation to have reached.
And then there is another remarkable subplot.
The law firm representing Toms River has been trying to withdraw from the case.
Not once.
Twice.
The firm's latest certification paints an extraordinary picture of its relationship with its own municipal client.
According to the decision, the lawyers told the Court that Toms River discharged the firm approximately four months earlier; that the firm had received no assurances it would voluntarily be paid for its legal services; and that the attorney-client relationship had become “even more dysfunctional and adversarial,” making continued representation “unreasonably difficult.”
There is another problem:
Apparently nobody else wants to take over.
The Court noted that despite “numerous inquiries,” the Township had not identified another law firm willing to assume its defense.
Judge Quinn nevertheless refused to let the current lawyers leave.
Why?
Because allowing them to walk away now could further derail cases already drowning in years of discovery delays.
The Court concluded that the existing lawyers possess extensive knowledge concerning the productions, missing devices and technical problems, and allowing withdrawal now would create still more delay.
Judge Quinn's answer was unequivocal:
“This cannot and will not occur.”
NOW THE BILL COULD BE $20,000 — EVERY SINGLE DAY
The Township's earlier contempt finding and $29,750 fee award apparently did not accomplish enough.
So Judge Quinn is now recommending something with considerably more teeth.
The plaintiffs asked for sanctions beginning at $25,000 per day and potentially climbing as high as $100,000 per day.
Toms River proposed just $1,000 per day.
Judge Quinn rejected both numbers and recommended:
$20,000 PER DAY.
For as many as 30 days.
Judge Quinn expressly recognized that because Toms River is a municipality, the financial burden ultimately falls upon the public.
But the Court concluded that this unfortunate reality does not justify imposing a sanction so small that the Township can simply shrug it off.
The prior $29,750 sanction, repeated extensions and repeated warnings had already failed to produce full compliance.
And the Court emphasized that Toms River's problems are not merely technical.
The Township has repeatedly failed to comply with court orders and, according to Judge Quinn, declined to authorize necessary forensic work on several outstanding devices.
That, the Court found, remains within Toms River's control and supports a “meaningful coercive sanction.”
There is one important procedural distinction.
Judge Quinn is a Magistrate Judge, and the $20,000-per-day sanction has therefore not yet actually been imposed.
Instead, Judge Quinn has taken the extraordinary step of formally certifying the facts to United States District Judge Zahid N. Quraishi for consideration of civil contempt.
Toms River has now been ordered to appear before Judge Quraishi, at a date and time still to be set, and show cause why it should not be held in civil contempt and subjected to the proposed coercive sanctions.
The Township also has 14 days to object to Judge Quinn's certification and recommendation.
So the final decision on the recommended $20,000-per-day penalty will be Judge Quraishi's.
But make no mistake about where things now stand.
Years ago, this litigation was about whether Orthodox Jews seeking to build small neighborhood shuls in Toms River had been treated unlawfully.
The Township denied wrongdoing.
The plaintiffs wanted to see what was happening behind the scenes.
Then came discovery.
Then came the orders.
Then came the extensions.
Then came the missed deadlines.
Then came contempt.
Then came attorneys' fees.
Then came missing devices, wiped devices, factory-reset devices, inaccessible devices and devices the Township allegedly would not pay to have forensically searched.
Then the Township's own attorneys tried to leave.
And now a federal Magistrate Judge has concluded that the Township's conduct warrants consideration of civil contempt, a possible $20,000 fine every day, and — if that still does not produce compliance — potentially a motion to strike the Township's Answers altogether.
For years, Toms River officials have been able to keep the merits of these discrimination allegations buried beneath an endless discovery battle.
That strategy — intentional or otherwise — has now brought the Township to a very different place.
This time, it is Toms River Township that has been ordered to show up in federal court and explain itself.
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