TRENTON — Two state Superior Court judges are being promoted to the Appellate Division, officials said today. The appointments of judges Douglas Fasciale, of Union County, and Ellen Koblitz, of Bergen County, take effect Aug. 1, Supreme Court Chief Justice Stuart Rabner said in a statement. Fasciale is the presiding judge of the civil division in the Union Vicinage....
Judge Douglas Fasciale in this 2005 file photo. TRENTON — Two state Superior Court judges are being promoted to the Appellate Division, officials said today.
The appointments of judges Douglas Fasciale, of Union County, and Ellen Koblitz, of Bergen County, take effect Aug. 1, Supreme Court Chief Justice Stuart Rabner said in a statement.
Fasciale is the presiding judge of the civil division in the Union Vicinage. Appointed to the bench by Gov. James E. McGreevey, he was sworn in on Nov. 5, 2004.
The judge was first assigned to the special civil part of the law division of the Superior Court, Union County. He subsequently served in the family, civil and criminal divisions of the Superior Court. After serving in the criminal division for one year, he was named presiding judge and chose to be the Drug Court judge.
Fasciale, a graduate of Seton Hall University and Seton Hall Law School, lives in Westfield with his wife, Teresa, and two children, Michael and Steven.
Koblitz is the presiding judge of the general equity part in the Bergen Vicinage.
She was appointed to the bench by Gov. Jim Florio and took the oath of office on March 8, 1993. Koblitz was first assigned to the civil division and moved to the family division later that year. She was assigned to the criminal division for a year, from September 1997 to September 1998. She then served as presiding judge of the family division until Oct. 1, 1998, when she was tapped to lead the general equity part.
While on the bench, Koblitz has served as a member and then chair of the Conference of Family Division Presiding Judges, chair of the Children in Court Improvement Committee and vice chair of the Supreme Court Family Practice Committee.
Koblitz graduated from the University of Chicago and Yale Law School. She started her career in the New Jersey Office of the Public Defender, where she rose to become deputy public defender in charge of the Bergen County regional office.
The Appellate Division of the Superior Court is New Jersey’s intermediate appellate court. The 35 division judges hear appeals from decisions of the trial courts, Tax Court and state administrative agencies. The division decides approximately 7,000 appeals and 7,500 motions each year.
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