Dorothy Chin Brandt, an attorney who became the first Asian American judge in New York State in 1987, was therefore elected to public office by one of the first two Asian Americans in the state and died in Queens on January 27. . She is 78 years old.
Her partner Jack MacCo said the cause of death in the hospital was a complication of sepsis. The couple plans to get married after recovery.
In 1986, Judge Chi Brandt lost his civil court campaign in Manhattan as a private practice lawyer without a political foundation, earning 138 votes from about 100,000 actors.
The following year, she won the Democratic primary and general election, for other Asian Americans to be elected as the New York State Legislature. State representing Congress; and serving in New York City (including the City Council).
However, less than forty years ago, her election was groundbreaking. At the time, there were two Asian-American judges in the state, both of which were appointed rather than elected. One of them is a housing court judge, and Chinese-born Peter Tom was also elected as a civil court in 1987 (in 1994, he became the first Asian court to be appointed to the Supreme Court, the Appeal Division, the First Class. American. Retired in 2019.)
Justice Chin Brandt recalled her first day on the bench in an interview in 2016, saying, “I showed up in the clerk’s office and they thought I was an interpreter because of course I couldn’t be a judge.”
In another interview, she noted: “I have an Asian American face who has never met an Asian American judge.”
She was appointed Supreme Court Justice by Chief Executive Judge Jonathan Lippman in 2001 and retired in 2016.
“She described her as “very capable, elegant judge and human” in an interview: “She wrote a script for Asian Americans in New York courts and is a role model for Asian American female judges,” Judge Lipman said in an interview. and the Trail Blazers. Dorothy is also a leader in Chinese and Asian American bars, very positive and influential in the legal and judicial circles. ”
State Sen. John Liu, a Queen Democrat and former New York City auditor-general, said Justice Chi Brandt was “a true pioneer and inspiration for Asian Americans in New York and beyond.”
Dorothy Ku Chin was born on April 9, 1946 in Manhattan. At that time, her father, American-born doctor, Henry Chin, served as Army Captain. Her mother, registered nurse Hsui (Ling) Chin, was born in Beijing. Justice Chin Brandt will be the first descendant of Chinese immigrants’ office to win elections in New York State.
Dorothy grew up in Queens and graduated from Hunter College High School in Manhattan. MacCo said she received her bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of Chicago in 1968 and planned to become a doctor, but turned to law because she could not stand the blood, he said.
She taught for a year and then attended Brooklyn Law School. She graduated in 1974 and received her Master of Law from Harvard Law School the following year.
While teaching at Boston University’s Law School, she served as assistant dean of graduate legal studies at Harvard University. She returned to New York in 1978, working as a partner at Shearman & Sterling, and later joined Dilworth Paxson in Washington.
She said she was prompted to run for public events after a retired judge eavesdropped on a racist remark during a public event.
In 1984, she married stockbroker Kevin Brandt; they divorced in 1989. Her older brother Frederick died in 2005. Mr. McCoy is her only direct survivor.
Justice Chin Brandt served in the civil courts in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens; in the criminal courts in Queens; and from 1991 to 1992 and 2001 to 2016, acting as a judge in the Supreme Court of New York.
While sitting in the civil court, she was the founder of the Franklin H. Williams Judicial Committee, a court-based group dedicated to fostering racial and racially diverse participation in the court and legal community and improving the system for Treatment of minorities.
In 2019, she won the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Chinese American Organization.
Randall T. Ing (Randall T.) wrote: “Her scholarships, outstanding judicial temperament and her ability to mentor new lawyers and judges in court are evaluated by judges and court personnel.”
