New York.- Manhattan Civil Court judge Rita Mella on Thursday won a bench in that borough’s Surrogate Court with 59% of the votes, a major jump in the fledgeling career of the Dominican-born attorney.
She beat Barbara Jaffe in the Democratic primary to replace judge Kristen Booth Glen, who has reached the mandatory retirement age of 70, as one of the borough’s two surrogates. There was no Republican candidate.
The Surrogate Court bench was one of the few positions that had generated much competition in the primary for which the candidates had raised two weeks ago a combined $320,000, much of it from their own pocketbooks and law firm contributions.