Murphy to name three new judges

Gov. Phil Murphy plans to nominate three new Superior Court judges as he continues his path toward reducing the large number of judicial vacancies in New Jersey.

Dina Mikulka, 53, a former deputy attorney general and an unsuccessful Democratic candidate for Morris County Commissioner in 2021, will get an open seat in Sussex County.

Two new judges are being named in Monmouth County: Jason Rockwell, the 47-year-old deputy director of the New Jersey Attorney General’s Division of Law; and Natalie S. Watson, 46, a partner at one of the state’s oldest law firms, McCarter & English.   Both are Democrats.

A former partner at Patton Boggs and law clerk to U.S. District Court Judge Garrett Brown, Rockwell has been an assistant attorney general for seven years.

Watson serves on the Garden State Equality Action Fund board.

If the Senate confirms the three new candidates, it will bring the total number of judicial vacancies to 57.

There are currently 22 judicial candidates who have been nominated by Gov. Phil Murphy but are still awaiting Senate confirmation; the other 35 open judgeships do not yet have a designated nominee.  The Senate confirmed eight new judges on Monday.

But one of the judgeships listed as filled belongs to Jill Mayer, a former deputy attorney general who was confirmed in January 2022 but still hasn’t taken office because she’s seeking to take a $127,000  annual pension on top of her $175,000 salary.