Robbins Flying The Nest?

The word going around Woodbridge Township, and well beyond, is that Judge Spencer Robbins, the Head Judge in Woodbridge Township’s Courts, who has a law practice in Woodbridge, and sits on the board of the BCB Community Bank (formerly the Allegiance Bank) Woodbridge, has resigned his seat on the bench in Woodbridge Township.  Interestingly, Robbins' business associate and former shareholder in the Allegiance Bank, James P. Nolan, Esq., still serves as the Woodbridge Township attorney, and may now hold shares in BCB. There are no indications, at this time, that Nolan is involved in Robbins' trials and tribulations.

There is a certain irony in the fact that Robbins, as a lawyer and sitting judge in three municipalities, those being, Woodbridge, So. Plainfield and Sayerville, as of January 2013, has found himself on the other side of the bench, so to speak, on more than one occasion.  The details of his ‘record’ can be found in articles published by NJ.Com, the Home News Tribune, and the Woodbridge Patch.  As the Woodbridge Patch article may well be the most informative,  it follows hereinafter:

Judge Who Voted in Wrong Town Gets New Term on the Woodbridge Bench

Judge Spencer B. Robbins lives in Chatham but voted from his law office in Woodbridge for 12 years

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Woodbridge Judge Spencer B. Robbins, who moved to Chatham in 1998 but continued voting from his Woodbridge law office for 12 years, was reappointed to another three-year term as a municipal judge.

Robbins' reappointment was buried in a New Year flurry of resolutions that the council voted on at their reorganization meeting earlier this month. He makes approximately $77,000 in the position, according to a Home News Tribune report.

The trouble came about when it was learned that Robbins, who owns a law practice in Woodbridge, had been voting from his office address since 1998, four years after he was appointed to a judgeship here. He was stopped after Christopher Struben, the Republican candidate for mayor who lost in the 2011 election, complained about Robbins' illegally voting from his Woodbridge law office. 

Struben and several town residents demanded that Mayor John McCormac or the town council remove Robbins from the bench. Council Attorney Craig Coughlin said that the council had no power to discipline Robbins.

The Middlesex County Board of Elections unanimously ruled that Robbins was in the wrong, and the matter afterwards was taken up by the state judicial ethics panel. 

Their decisions are considered to be confidential, unless a judge is removed from the bench.

It wasn't Robbins' first brush with ethics panels. In 2004, he was admonished by the Disciplinary Review Board (DRB) of the NJ Supreme Court. They charged that Robbins had failed to comply with an investigator's request for a grievance filed against him; failed to sign an agreement in lieu of being disciplined; and failed to file a timely answer to a formal ethics complaint.

An admonishment is considered to be the least severe form of discipline that can be meted out to an attorney, according to the DRB report.

Struben also pointed out that Robbins was chairman of the board of directors of Allegiance Bank, a financial institution with which the township does business. Allegiance merged with BCB Community Bank in 2011, and Robbins sits on their board of directors.

Robbins' financial interest in the bank was a conflict of interest, Struben said. The township still holds accounts in the institution.

Robbins was admitted to the bar in New York and New Jersey in 1981. He served as municipal prosecutor in Woodbridge from 1988 to 1994, when he was appointed as a municipal judge. He also serves as a municipal judge in South Plainfield and Sayreville. END

It is uncertain which one or more of Robbins’ legal woes, including a recent law suit filed by a prominent local businessman alleging Robbins committed a $500,000.00 fraud against him, may be behind Robbins rumored resignation.  

It is believed that Robbins may have been granted PTI (Pre Trial Intervention), but the details of that claim have yet to be confirmed.

It remains to be seen if Robbins will still hold onto his municipal pensions or license to practice law in New Jersey, if in fact he has been, or may, be found guilty of ethics and/or other serious criminal violations.

One thing is certain, there are many you will revel at Robbins having to take a seat on a park bench, rather than one as a judge in any court!