Judge Michael Coccoma

Announces Retirement

COOPERSTOWN – After 25 years on the state judiciary, Judge Michael V. Coccoma, Deputy Chief Administrative Judge for Courts outside of New York City, has announced his retirement at the end of June.

He began his legal career in Otsego County in private practice in 1979. In 1980 he was appointed as Assistant District Attorney. Over the years he served as Otsego County Attorney and as District Attorney. Elected in 1994 as Otsego County Judge, he heard cases in County, Family and Surrogate’s Courts.

After his election as a State Supreme Court Justice in 2007 he was appointed Administrative Judge of the 10 Southern Tier counties of the 6th Judicial District in 2008 in addition to his trial court duties.

He was instrumental in the formation of the County’s first Drug Treatment Court. For many years he worked with the Drug Treatment Court team and presided over the biweekly court proceedings.

Over the course of his career, he facilitated many important initiatives for the judiciary. In 2013
he was tasked with leading a team of seasoned criminal court judges from outside New York City as part
of an effort to address a chronic backlog of pending criminal cases in Bronx County.

After the 2018 enactment of the new law raising the age of criminal responsibility from 16 to 18
years of age, he was designated, along with Deputy Chief Administrative Judge Edwina Mendelson, to
prepare the State judiciary for implementation of the law and to serve on the Governor’s Task Force.

In July of 2019 he was selected as one of four regional judges outside New York City to manage
the pretrial preparations of the many lawsuits filed under the recently enacted Child Victims Act.

Most recently, he served ten years in the appointed post of Deputy Chief Administrative Judge for Courts outside New York City, supervising the daily trial court operations of all 57 counties, including over 600 state judges and 5,000 court employees in addition to Town and Village courts.