The Queens County Democratic party nominated five judges for the upcoming race for New York State Supreme Court last Thursday — including the first ever Muslim candidate for the Supreme Court bench in Queens.
The judges the party chose to elevate during its annual judicial convention include Civil Court Judges Soma Syed and Sandra Pérez, Queens County Civil Court, Supervising Judge Ira Greenberg; and acting Supreme Court Justices Frances Wang and Gary Miret.
“These are extraordinary individuals for the times in which we live. Individuals who bring differences to the bench in Queens County and individuals who have a record of fairness,” said U.S. Representative Greg Meeks, who serves as the county party chairman.
As required by law, the Supreme Court justices are nominated by a group of judicial delegates — a grassroots elected position — who convene in a post-primary meeting to vote on who party leaders select to appear on the ballot in November.
At the Queen Democrat’s judicial conventions, delegates handpicked by the party leaders, including Meeks and party officers Michael Reich and Frank Bolz, formally nominate a slate of judicial candidates that are selected behind closed doors prior to the gathering — with some exceptions. The party picked the five nominees out of a list of 17 judges who applied for the position. There’s always an opportunity for delegates to go rogue and nominate their own candidate — as almost happened at the Queens meeting.
During the proceeding, delegate Seth Slade nominated a second candidate, Civil Court Judge Michael Goldman, as a challenge to the nomination of Syed. Goldman had applied for one of the vacancies but did not appear at the convention to declare his intention to contest the Democratic Party’s selection. Slade’s motion didn’t end up getting support to move forward — so it never went for a vote.
Some of the candidates may face Republican challengers in the general election, but in a borough where Democrats outnumber Republicans seven to one, the Democratic candidates are very likely to win their election.
Soma Syed
Syed is a Queens Civil Court judge, who would be the first Muslim on the state supreme court bench in Queens if elected in November.
After graduating from Albany Law School, Syed started her own practice and spent nearly two decades working as a private attorney mostly in civil matters. Born in Bangladesh and raised in Jamaica, Queens, Syed said the “12-year-old me never imagined that one day she would become a supreme court justice.”
After losing a run for City Council representing eastern Queens, Syed set her sights on Queens Civil Court in 2021 and won her race as an insurgent candidate. In that election, Syed beat Goldman, who had run with the endorsement of the Queens Democratic Party, in the Democratic primary. After that election, she became a City Court Judge in Queens.
“I can promise you that I will continue to serve the people impartially and with dignity and respect and [most] importantly uphold the rule of law,” Syed said. “Every day when I’m in court, I want to make sure I listen to everyone, I hear everyone and I do a good job. So thank you for this tremendous responsibility.”
Sandra Pérez
Pérez was elected to the New York City Civil Court in Queens County in 2023.
She started her career at the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office before starting her own firm, working as a public defender and working at several different firms where she took on trial work in federal court. She is a founding and current advisory board member of the Latino Lawyers Association of Queens County, and is fluent in Spanish.
“In my courtroom, I am the judge for everyone,” she said. “… You are going to get justice.”
During her speech she emphasized how her spot on the ballot is the culmination of a long journey to the bench.
“I was not appointed. I waited and waited and waited for [almost] 30 years to get to this space because I’m not politically connected. I come from working parents.”
Ira Greenberg
Greenberg serves as a supervising judge in Queens County Civil Court, where he was elected in 2019.
Greenberg began his legal career as counsel to former Assemblymember Catherine Nolan, whom he had formerly served prior to getting his law degree as legislative director. He went on to a private practice in elderlaw, wills, trusts and estates and real estate and civil litigation from 2002 to 2018 in Woodside, Queens.
He’s served on a number of civic advisory groups such as the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Board and the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA. As a judge, in 2023 he recommended legislation to expand family court’s jurisdiction to include name changes for minors, which was subsequently passed into law.
“I have taken all these memories and experiences with me as I reside on the bench. These experiences have reinforced that all people deserve respect, deference in an open ear and eye. They have a right to be heard and treated fairly,” Greenberg said.
Gary Miret
Miret was assigned to be the presiding judge for the borough’s DWI court in 2021 after being appointed to the New York Court of Claims by Governor Kathy Hochul. He’s also served as an acting Supreme Court justice for several years.
Miret clerked in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York and was a prosecutor in the Queens District Attorney’s office. For around 25 years he ran his own general practice law firm before joining the bench.
“I can’t make everyone happy. Someone is going to walk out of Judge Miret’s courtroom unhappy whether a defense attorney or an ADA, but I guarantee them all that at the end of the day, they will receive fairness and justice from me,” he said.
The son of Cuban immigrants, Miret is a member of the Latino Lawyers Association of Queens County and the Latino Judges Association, who described himself to the judicial convention as “the child of parents who fled communism — so I know democracy. I know what it is to lose everything.”
Frances Wang
Wang, who was appointed to the Bronx Criminal Court in 2017, was transferred to Queens Criminal Court and became an Acting Supreme Court Justice in 2021.
Wang began her legal career in the Bronx District Attorney’s office, where she worked for several years until she got a position as principal court attorney under Bronx Supreme Court Judge Seth Marvin.
Wang, who was born in Singapore to Taiwanese parents, is the vice-president of the Asian American Judges Association of New York. She is fluent in Taiwanese and proficient in Mandarin. She was the first Taiwanese judge to be appointed by a mayor.
“I’ll continue to be committed to upholding values of justice and fairness that our community deserves, and those who know me well know that I grew up living in another country and moved to this country with my family when I was eight years old,” Wang said. “So when they say that Queens is the world’s borough, I truly understand that.”
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story has been corrected to reflect that Soma Syed would be the first Muslim state supreme court judge in Queens if elected, not in the state.
