Gerald C. Escala

SPECIAL COUNSEL

TEL: (201) 342-6000 X 218
FAX: (201) 342-6611
gescala@hertenburstein.com

Gerald C. Escala retired in 2006 after more than 14 years on the bench in Bergen County as Judge of the Superior Court of New Jersey. He spent his first seven years hearing divorces and family matters, and in 1998 was assigned to the Chancery Division, where for the remainder of his judicial career he managed and heard cases involving business breakups, shareholder-oppression claims, real-property disputes, will contests, and election matters, in what is probably the busiest Chancery venue in the state. He was designated presiding judge of the Family Part in 1997 and presiding judge of the Chancery Division (General Equity and Probate) in 2004. Since 1997, he was designated by the Assignment Judge in Bergen County to act as assignment judge in her absence.

Before his appointment to the state bench in 1991, he was in private law practice in Englewood and Tenafly for 26 years. From 1973 to 1991, he was municipal court judge in Washington Township, Westwood, Demarest, and Rockleigh. At Herten Burstein, he is consulting counsel and also acts as mediator in cases in the areas of general equity, probate, and matrimonial law.

A graduate of Lafayette College, Mr. Escala studied Russian and East European history at Columbia University and then attended Seton Hall University School of Law, receiving his J.D. degree after four years of night course work.

He volunteers as backstage tour guide at the Metropolitan Opera House in Lincoln Center, New York City.

  

EDUCATION
Lafayette College
(A.B. 1957)

Columbia University
(Graduate Faculties and Russian Institute)

Seton Hall University
(J.D. 1964)

ADMITTED TO PRACTICE
New Jersey
U.S. Tax Court
U.S. Supreme Court