Chief judge application deadline is extended
ALBANY — The Commission on Judicial Nomination has extended its deadline from Tuesday to Friday for applicants seeking to become the next chief judge of New York.
The announcement followed a story published Monday in the Times Union that indicated the commission was considering an extension after receiving a limited number of new applicants following the state Senate’s rejection of appellate Justice Hector D. Lasalle, who had been nominated by Gov. Kathy Hochul. The commission had previously extended its deadline for applications for the Court of Appeals in December 2020 during the pandemic.
The prolonged time period allows for anyone to apply beyond the original 41 applicants who sought consideration for the position after Court of Appeals Chief Judge Janet Difiore resigned Aug. 31. The seven-member court has been functioning with six members for more than six months.
“The commission is mindful, however, of the novel circumstances presented and the need to swiftly fill the vacancy,” the commission said in a news release Feb. 17, when it again announced the vacancy following Lasalle’s rejection. “Accordingly, the commission will work to promptly discharge its constitutional and statutory responsibilities.”
Among the 41 original applicants, all of whom are to be reconsidered for the position unless they actively withdraw, more than half are women and 17 are of diverse backgrounds, according to the commission. Out of the 17 candidates who were interviewed, there were 10 women and seven “ethnic minorities.”
The commission presented seven finalists to Hochul and she nominated Lasalle, who was the lone candidate with a prosecutorial background. That history in a district attorney’s office was one of the key factors that Senate Democrats said were a non-starter for them when considering the future of the Court of Appeals, which they viewed as ideologically split.
According to New York Focus, all three of the relatively liberal-leaning judges on the court applied for the chief judge vacancy: Shirley Troutman, Jenny Rivera and Rowan Wilson. None of the three were selected to be finalists. The identities of applicants for the Court of Appeals, outside of the finalists, are, by statute, not released by the commission.
While the number of applicants for an associate justice to the Court of Appeals may garner more submissions, the last time there was a vacancy for the top position, following the retirement of Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman in 2015, there were 33 applicants. About a quarter of them were women or individuals with “diverse” backgrounds.
According to a source familiar with the matter, a handful of potential candidates are in discussions although they may not have applied yet.
They include Justice Rolando T. Acosta, outgoing presiding justice of the First Department; Associate Justice Joseph A. Zayas, who serves on the Second Department; Kings County District Attorney Eric Gonzalez, a Brooklyn Democrat; Andrew G. Celli Jr., founding partner of Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP; and Caitlin J. Halligan, a partner at the New York City-based law firm Selendy Gay Elsberg.