Nine new judges are headed to the benches of Baltimore City and Montgomery County after Governor Wes Moore announced a sweeping round of judicial appointments Thursday, filling five Circuit Court seats and four District Court seats with a roster heavy on former prosecutors and public safety officials.
Moore, a Democrat, appointed the nine jurists per the governor's office, saying their expertise and experience will serve Maryland residents in their judicial roles. According to the Maryland Daily Record, the appointments span three Baltimore City Circuit Court judges, two Montgomery County Circuit Court judges, and four Montgomery County District Court judges.
Baltimore's New Circuit Court Bench
In Baltimore City, Sean Richard Delaney, James Burke Miller, and Jocelyn Lang Williams were named Circuit Court judges. Delaney joined the U.S. Department of Justice through the Attorney General's Honors Program as a Tax Division trial attorney before spending 12 years in the U.S. Attorney's Office Fraud and Public Corruption Section in Baltimore, according to the Office of Governor Wes Moore. The Daily Record's reporting adds that he also served as a special assistant U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia and worked in the economic crimes unit for the District of Massachusetts, following his studies at Boston College Law School.
Miller currently chairs the felony trial division in the Baltimore City State's Attorney's Office and serves as lead attorney for the Archdiocese of Baltimore abuse workgroup, per the same account. He began his career clerking for former Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Christopher Panos. He later prosecuted homicide and special victims cases for the city, worked for the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit within the Maryland Attorney General's Office, and served as a prosecutor in Prince George's County. Miller is a graduate of the University of Baltimore School of Law.
Williams brings eight years of experience as an administrative law judge at the Maryland Office of Administrative Hearings, where the report notes she is a certified mediator and subject matter specialist in child abuse and neglect, involuntary admissions, and not-criminally-responsible and forced-medication hearings. She previously worked as a staff attorney in Maryland Legal Aid's Baltimore office child advocacy unit and holds a law degree from the Dickinson School of Law at Pennsylvania State University.
Montgomery County Picks Up Two Circuit Judges
Keith Joseph Rosa and Carlotta Ann Woodward were appointed to the Montgomery County Circuit Court. Rosa served as a judicial law clerk to former Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge John W. Debelius III before becoming a special magistrate and leading both the Bar Association and Bar Foundation of Montgomery County, according to the Office of Governor Wes Moore. He co-founded the Bethesda-based firm Goitein Rosa LLC, where his practice focuses on civil litigation including family law, and he holds a law degree from Florida State University College of Law.
Woodward has 14 years of experience as a prosecutor with the Montgomery County State's Attorney's Office, where the Daily Record reports she chairs the juvenile division and serves as the office's primary prosecutor of animal cruelty cases. She previously worked as an associate at Cordier Law Offices, LLC, and studied at the University of Baltimore School of Law.
Four New District Court Judges
On the District Court side, Jason Brian Abbott, Rolando Julio Aleman, Howard Ray Cheris, and Seth Bradley Zucker were appointed to the Montgomery County District Court. Abbott serves as general counsel for public safety and homeland security in the Prince George's County Executive's Office and previously spearheaded Maryland's first statewide gang prosecution unit, according to The MoCo Show. He also worked as principal deputy state's attorney and chief of the Strategic Investigations Unit in the Prince George's County State's Attorney's Office, and he earned his degree from the Columbus School of Law at the Catholic University of America.
Aleman is an associate attorney at Salvado, Salvado & Salvado, P.C. in Rockville, having previously served as associate general counsel for the Maryland-National Capital Park & Planning Commission; he studied at the Dickinson School of Law at Pennsylvania State University, per the Daily Record. Cheris is lead partner at Armstrong, Cheris and Page, LLC in Rockville, with 17 years as a private practitioner concentrating on civil and criminal litigation and earlier work as a contract attorney for the Montgomery County Public Defender's Office; he holds a degree from the Washington College of Law at American University.
Zucker, meanwhile, chairs the Collateral Review Unit and Conviction Integrity Unit at the Montgomery County State's Attorney's Office. He previously worked as a trial prosecutor across the district, juvenile and circuit courts, and studied at William & Mary Law School, according to the Daily Record's reporting by Hannah Gaskill.
Different Paths to the Bench
The nine appointments carry very different political futures depending on which court the judges landed on. Under Article IV of the Maryland Constitution, Circuit Court appointees in Baltimore City and Montgomery County must run in a nonpartisan, cross-filed primary and general election in the first general election occurring at least one year after their appointment, with winners earning 15-year terms, according to Ballotpedia. District Court of Maryland judges, by contrast, serve 10-year terms following gubernatorial appointment and Senate confirmation and do not face public election campaigns, with jurisdiction over civil matters up to $30,000, landlord-tenant disputes, and misdemeanor criminal cases without jury trials.
Candidates for both benches pass through regional vetting bodies first. Maryland relies on 16 regional Trial Courts Judicial Nominating Commissions — including separate commissions for District 11 in Montgomery County and District 14 in Baltimore City — to evaluate candidate pools on integrity and legal acumen before forwarding shortlists to the governor, according to Maryland Courts. The Montgomery County Trial Courts Judicial Nominating Commission specifically consists of 13 members — local attorneys and lay members appointed by the governor — who gather community input and interview candidates before sending nomination lists to the executive branch.
Part of a Broader 2026 Bench Shuffle
Thursday's appointments follow a string of other moves reshaping Maryland's trial courts this year. The package comes on the heels of Moore's elevation of a Baltimore judge to the Appellate Court of Maryland in September, as well as a January elevation of a District Court judge to the Montgomery County Circuit Court. All Maryland state judges, regardless of court, face a mandatory retirement age of 70 under Article IV, Section 3 of the Maryland Constitution — a rule that fuels regular turnover on the bench.
That retirement age nearly changed this year. A legislative attempt to raise Maryland's mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 73 via House Bill 638 passed the Maryland House of Delegates in March but died when the General Assembly adjourned without final Senate approval in April, per Ballotpedia. The measure's failure leaves the current age limit in place for now, continuing to drive the kind of vacancies filled by this week's appointments.
