Administrator Joseph Voytus said the prior judge, Harry D. Norton, Jr., retired as of Jan. 1, 2024 and the former prosecutor, Steve Wellinghorst, resigned effective Dec. 31, 2023 due to other work obligations. The current public defender is Gerald Salerno.
Voytus said they hoped to have the new judge’s appointment no later than Jan. 8, the end of the legislative session.
On Dec. 29, the Borough Council voted 6-0 to remove a resolution from consideration that authorized Montvale’s withdrawal from the Joint Municipal Court. Had Montvale voted to withdraw, the move would not have been effective until Jan. 1, 2025, according to the original court agreement, and the court would have continued to operate through 2024.
Ghassali said the three towns could not unanimously agree on a choice for a new municipal court judge and prosecutor, as required under the Joint Court set-up, “and came to a standstill.” It was unclear what emergency existed although the public notice said substantial harm to the public interest would result from the delay of this meeting until 2024.
Ghassali said the standstill, which was resolved the night before the special meeting, was caused by a lack of communication between the three towns’ officials.
Councilman Timothy Lane said he was around when the Joint Municipal Court was formed a decade ago and noted he was disappointed that the judge agreed upon by the three towns had no prior municipal court experience.
Moreover, several residents offering public comments also criticized the selected judge for an alleged lack of municipal court experience.
Some officials said though Bocchi allegedly lacked municipal court experience, he had likely appeared often in municipal court as an attorney representing clients and was familiar with court operations.
Lane suggested that Park Ridge and Woodcliff Lake should let their residents know why Bocchi was their choice. He said the Joint Court process between the three towns “was not working as well as it should” and said he was going into 2024 with “eyes wide open on this.” He said an approach might be a shared-service municipal court where Montvale operates the court and the two other towns pay to use it.