Associate Justice Helen E. Hoens

Justice Hoens was nominated to the Supreme Court by Gov. Jon S. Corzine on Sept. 21, 2006. She received Senate confirmation Oct. 23, and took her seat on the court Oct. 26, 2006. She served on the Court until Oct. 26, 2013.

Justice Hoens was born July 31, 1954 in Elizabeth. In 1976, she graduated with high honors from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va., and, in 1979, cum laude from Georgetown University Law Center. She was admitted to the bars in New Jersey and Washington, D.C. in 1979, and New York in 1981.

Justice Hoens began her legal career as a law clerk for Judge John J. Gibbons of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. She entered private practice in New York at Dewey, Ballantine, Bushby, Palmer and Wool and the law offices of Russel H. Beatie, Jr. In 1985, she became an associate with the Florham Park law firm of Pitney, Hardin, Kipp and Szuch. She later became a partner at Lum, Hoens, Conant, Danzis and Kleinberg, Roseland.

In 1994, she became a Superior Court judge assigned to the Civil Division of Vicinage 13, covering Hunterdon, Somerset and Warren counties. She was presiding judge for the civil part when, in 2002, she moved to the Appellate Division.

During her tenure as a judge, Justice Hoens served on the Judiciary Advisory Committee on Americans with Disabilities Act Compliance, the Supreme Court Special Committee on Surrogates' Trust Funds, and the Supreme Court Committee on Complementary Dispute Resolution. Justice Hoens is a member of the American Bar Association, a fellow of the American Bar Foundation, and a member of the bar associations of New Jersey, Somerset County, and the District of Columbia. She is an honorary member of the Essex County Bar Association and a former chair of the Committee on Rights of Persons with Disabilities. She is also master and member of the executive board of the Justice Marie E. Garibaldi Inn of Court for Alternative Dispute Resolution and a past director of the Historical Society of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.

Justice Hoens has served as a parent member of the Eden Institute's board of directors, a member of the State Parents Advisory Commission on the Handicapped (SPACH), a trustee of the Center for Outreach and Services to the Autism Community (COSAC), and served as pro bono general counsel to the Autism Society of America from 1989 to 1994.

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