Justice Joan A. Madden

Joan Madden is an elected Justice of the Supreme Court of New York State. She was first elected to serve in Civil Court in 1992, and was elected to Supreme Court in 1997, and re-elected in 2011. She is presently assigned to a medical malpractice part in New York County and was previously assigned to an IAS part where she presided over cases involving negligence, discrimination, labor law, complex asbestos litigation and commercial issues. Before coming to the bench, Justice Madden worked as a trial and supervising attorney for 18 years in the Criminal Defense Division of the Legal Aid Society where she represented clients and supervised attorneys in cases ranging from misdemeanors to the most serious felonies. She has served as the Chair of the Judicial Section of the New York County Lawyers Association, where issues addressed during her tenure included sex trafficking, immigration, grand jury reform, cameras in the courtroom and admissibility of social media evidence. Since her appointments in 2015, she has served as a member of the Tribal Courts Committee of the New York State Unified Court System and of the Litigation Coordinating Panel for the Unified Court System. Justice Madden has participated as a panelist and moderator in numerous conferences and CLE programs with respect to issues related to asbestos litigation, expert testimony and evidence, and she has served as a judge in competitions and for educational purposes in moot court programs sponsored by various bar associations.