KMC in the News: Moench Quoted in Challenge to Voter Residency

KMC Partner Matthew C. Moench recently litigated an election law case involving challenges to a voter’s domicile. A voter must be domiciled in a particular New Jersey municipality to be eligible to vote there.

The New Jersey Globe recently reported upon what it characterizes as a changeable definition of domicile, as reflected in the news story’s title: “Another year, another judicial definition of domicile in election contest.”

Moench represented his client’s interests before the Superior Court, with the story reporting as follows:

“But Matthew Moench, an attorney representing Oldham, argued that unlike other adult children who continue to use their parents’ home to vote, Gieger had never been a voter in Harvey Cedars; she grew up in Chatham, before her family became full-time Ocean County residents, and has moved around to different states for work.    Moench said Gieger is a registered voter in Massachusetts; Geiger acknowledged that she has a Massachusetts driver’s license and her car is registered and insured there.”

The judge ultimately agreed with Moench, which the New Jersey Globe explained as follows:

“She spends what really doesn’t even amount to a third of her days per year in Harvey Cedars,” [the judge] said.  “A preponderance of the evidence that Miss Geiger’s domicile is actually in Boston, Massachusetts.