Judge Alvin Hellerstein, who handled the Maduro, Trump and 9/11 cases in Manhattan federal court, dies at 92

Alvin K. Hellerstein, a Manhattan federal judge who presided over cases involving President Donald Trump, former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the Sept. 11 attacks in nearly three decades on the bench, died Wednesday. He was 92.

His death was confirmed by Edward Friedland, district executive for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, ABC7 New York reported, citing the Associated Press. No cause of death was given. The court said he died Wednesday morning surrounded by family, and the Jewish Center, a Manhattan synagogue where he was a longtime member and trustee, notified its congregants, Bloomberg Law reported.

What happens to his cases

Hellerstein's cases, including the Maduro prosecution, are expected to be randomly assigned to other judges in the district, Reuters reported. Maduro's trial is scheduled for next June. Just two weeks ago, Hellerstein presided over a hearing in the narco-terrorism conspiracy case against Maduro, who was captured earlier this year.

A long career at 500 Pearl Street

• Background: before joining the bench he served in the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General's Corps and worked as a Manhattan litigator. President Bill Clinton appointed him in 1998, and he took senior status in 2011 while keeping a robust docket, according to ABC7.
• 9/11 litigation: for about two decades he oversaw dozens of wrongful-death, injury and property damage lawsuits that followed the attack on the World Trade Center. Lawyers credited him with empathy for victims' families and with rejecting settlement offers he considered too low. Some families were dismayed when, in 2008, he ended an effort to force the city to keep searching for human remains in debris moved from ground zero to the Staten Island landfill, ABC7 reported.
• Trump: in August, in one of his last major rulings, he rejected for a third time Trump's effort to move his state hush money case to federal court and have it dismissed on presidential immunity grounds. In 2020, he ordered Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen released from prison, ruling that the government's move to revoke his home confinement was retaliatory.
• Wall Street: he also presided over the criminal case against Archegos founder Bill Hwang, Bloomberg Law noted.

Hellerstein was known for a quirky independent streak and strict courtroom discipline. He required spectators to wear masks for more than two years after other judges had dropped the practice, ABC7 reported.