Justice Peter Tom, pictured center, with a judicial panel last week at the Court of Appeals. Seven of the justices, including Tom, heard argument in ‘People v. Boone’.
Two Asian-American justices sat last week by designation in the Court of Appeals, apparently achieving a first for Asian-American jurists in the state.
It is believed that the designations of Appellate Division, First Department, Justice Peter Tom and Appellate Division, Second Department, Justice Randall Eng marked the first time that an Asian-American had heard a high court case.
Gary Spencer, a spokesman for the Court of Appeals, on Monday said that while the court has not kept track of sitting justices’ ethnicities, court staff with “institutional knowledge” believed that Tom and Eng represented a first for Asian-American jurists.
Tom, who has been a member of the Appellate Division, First Department, for more than 20 years, said that he was told, after arriving in Albany last Tuesday to hear arguments in People v. Boone, Case No. 55, that he was the first Asian-American judge to sit on the court.
He was designated by Court of Appeals Chief Judge Janet DiFiore to join a seven-member panel in the case after a different high-court justice had recused himself, Tom said.
He said that he was proud to represent his community.
“I think it shows how far Asian-Americans have progressed in this country,” Tom said on Monday. “The Court of Appeals was created back in 1847. … It’s a great honor for the Asian-American community to have one of their representatives be up at the Court of Appeals.”
Justice Randall Eng. NYLJ/Rick Kopstein
Eng, the presiding justice of the Appellate Division, Second Department, said in a separate phone interview Monday that he was designated to the high-court panel in Carlson v. AIG, Case No. 56, after a justice likewise recused him or herself.
Eng noted that in 1983, when he was initially appointed to the Criminal Court of the City of New York, he believes he became the first Asian-American to hold any judicial position in the state.
“This rounds out my judicial career,” Eng said of sitting Oct. 18 in the Court of Appeals. “It takes me on a total arc in my career … [and it's] a great personal honor.”
“It certainly underscores the enormous progress that Asian-American judges and lawyers have made in just the space of generation,” he added.
