Metro

Judge invalidates verdict because hearing was illegally held on a Sunday

A Brooklyn judged tossed out a $42 million award because the Orthodox Jewish arbitrators violated a little-known state law by holding a hearing on Sunday, court papers state.

Six siblings quarreling over their dead mom Gertrude Bauer’s estate agreed in 2012 to let arbitrators divvy up her assets based on Torah law.

But when some of the siblings protested the cut arbitrators awarded them in 2013, Brooklyn Supreme Court Judge Edgar Walker threw out the award on the technicality.

“A court shall not be opened, or transact any business on Sunday, nor shall a court transact any business on a Saturday in any case where such day is kept as a holy day by any party to the case,” Walker wrote in his decision Monday.

“That’s the law. That’s the way it works,” said J. Michael Gottesman, who represents one of the siblings.

“Now they’re going to have to either settle the dispute or go to court.”

Walker said in his decision that he also tossed the suit because the arbitrators decided issues they are unqualified to determine and because they awarded improper attorneys’ fees.

The judge also disregarded a filing from one of the siblings claiming the Sunday meeting actually happened on a different day of the week.