Judges Mostofsky and Montalbano nominated for Supreme Court in Brooklyn

August 13, 2019 Rob Abruzzese

Hon. Steven Mostofsky will be on the ballot for Brooklyn Supreme Court in November, since he was nominated by the local Democratic Party on Thursday. Eagle file photos by Rob Abruzzese

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A pair of lower court judges in Brooklyn were endorsed by the Kings County Democratic Executive Committee last week, which will put them on the ballot in the general election as New York State Supreme Court justices.

Judges Steven Mostofsky and Rosemarie Montalbano were nominated at the Brooklyn Democratic Party headquarters last Monday.

On Thursday, the judges officially received the Democratic nomination for state Supreme Court judge at a judicial convention held at St. Francis College on Thursday night. This will put them on the ballot for the general election. With no Republican challengers expected, this means both will likely be installed as Kings County Supreme Court justices in January.

Hon. Rosemarie Montalbano will be on November’s ballot after being nominated on Thursday.

Mostofsky is a Yeshiva College and New York Law School graduate who had a private practice based in family and matrimonial law before his election to the Civil Court in 2012.

Judge Mostofsky sat in Family Court in 2013 and 2014 before he was moved to Civil Court, where he sat until 2017. Since then he has served as an acting justice of the Brooklyn Supreme Court and has served in the mental hygiene part.

Judge Montalbano, a St. John’s University and Western New England Law School graduate, is a former law clerk and assistant district attorney before she was elected to the Criminal Court in 2014.

Both judges are active in the local bar associations and regularly attend functions hosted by the Brooklyn Bar Association, the Columbian Lawyers Association and the Brooklyn Brandies Society.

Judge Mostofsky has hosted a special program in conjunction with the Kings County Supreme Court’s Mental Hygiene Part, where he gave access for judges and lawyers working in the court to Columbia University Medical College’s Dr. Philip Muskin for a question-and-answer session.

That session gave those in attendance an opportunity to ask the doctor questions about psychiatry, diagnosis and psychopharmacology and gave them hypothetical fact patterns so they can better understand trends that they may see before them in court.

Judge Montalbano was asked to speak to the Columbian Lawyers last year about domestic violence as part of the association’s continuing legal education curriculum. As part of that program, she discussed the hidden impacts that domestic violence can have on families and talked about the Brooklyn domestic violence court, which was the first-ever court of its kind created in the U.S. in 1996.