Gov. Phil Murphy plans to nominate three new Superior Court Judges from Passaic County, including former Freeholder Ronda Casson Cotroneo.
Also slated for open judgeships are Joy-Michele Johnson, the executive director of the New Jersey State Ethics Commission and a former senior counsel to Gov. Phil Murphy, and Administrative Law Judge Elissa Mizzone Testa.
The three are part of a Passaic judges package involving State Sens. Nellie Pou (D-North Haledon) and Kristin Corrado (R-Totowa). Cotroneo was promoted by Pou, Testa was recommended by Corrado, and Johnson was the governor’s pick.
As part of the agreement, former Ringwood Councilman William Marsala, a Republican, will also get signoff by Pou, the New Jersey Globe has learned. Marsala came within 1,012 votes of winning a Passaic County Commissioner race in 2021; Murphy nominated him to a judgeship in June 2023, but Pou had held him up.
Cotroneo was elected in 2012 on a Democratic ticket that ousted three Republican incumbents who had scored upset victories in 2009. She declined to seek re-election in 2015 – Sandi Lazzara replaced her on a ticket with John Bartlett and Hector Lora – and after Lora became mayor of Passaic, Cotroneo became the municipal court judge.
Now a Passaic County resident, Johnson is a former Keyport councilwoman. It’s not immediately clear if she will take a leave from her ethics commission post while she seeks senators’ support for a Superior Court judgeship.
Testa is the daughter of former Superior Court Judge Philip Mizzone, a veteran Passaic County GOP insider.
Murphy sent fourteen new judicial nominations to the Senate last month as part of his plan to end the state’s judicial shortage, now down to 47 vacancies. Twelve of the fourteen already have signoff, and Marsala would make thirteen.
Pearl Minato, a former deputy attorney general in the Office of Public Integrity and Accountability, was nominated last year and wasn’t confirmed when the legislative session ended. Now she must get signoff from a freshman Republican, State Sen. Latham Tiver (R-Southampton).