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INTRODUCTION
The resignation of Justice Sherri L. Eisenpress from the Supreme Court of the Ninth Judicial District in Rockland County, New York, marks one of the most significant breaches of judicial ethics in the history of the regional judiciary. This report details a comprehensive investigation into the systemic failures that allowed a culture of social intimacy between the bench and the matrimonial bar to flourish, eventually leading to formal disciplinary charges, a permanent resignation, and a crisis of legitimacy for the Ninth Judicial District Grievance Committee.
At the center of this inquiry is not only the conduct of Justice Eisenpress, but the profoundly compromised position of Susan G. Yellen, Esq., a member of the Grievance Committee for the Ninth Judicial District, and the founding partner of Eisenberg Yellen, LLP. Yellen’s law partner and co-founder, Amy M. Eisenberg, Esq., was one of the primary participants in the improper social circle surrounding the judge—appearing in at least 18 cases before Eisenpress without disclosure of their intimate personal relationship. That Susan Yellen holds any position of authority over attorney discipline while her own law partner was a key enabler of one of the worst judicial ethics scandals in the district’s history is not merely a conflict of interest. It is a staggering, inexcusable hypocrisy that undermines public confidence in the entire disciplinary system.
THE RESIGNATION AND PLEA ARRANGEMENT OF JUSTICE SHERRI L. EISENPRESS
The formal downfall of Justice Sherri L. Eisenpress began with a series of disciplinary charges served by the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct (CJC) in August 2025. These charges alleged a pervasive and multi-year failure to disclose personal, social, and financial relationships with a select
group of attorneys who frequently appeared before her in high-stakes matrimonial matters. On January 28, 2026, Justice Eisenpress executed a resignation stipulation, agreeing to retire from the bench effective April 28, 2026, and affirming that she would never again seek or accept judicial office in the future.
Under Section 44, subdivision 4 of the Judiciary Law, the Commission on Judicial Conduct has the authority to investigate and determine whether a judge should be removed from office. Justice Eisenpress, in her plea-like arrangement, waived the statutory provision of confidentiality applicable to Commission proceedings to the limited extent that the stipulation and the Commission’s order would be made public. This waiver allowed the public to glimpse the underlying allegations of misconduct that fueled what the Rockland Report characterized as her “hasty retirement.” Commission Administrator Robert H. Tembeckjian emphasized that her permanent departure was the only appropriate resolution to maintain the integrity of the Unified Court System.
Justice Eisenpress’s career on the bench spanned fifteen years, beginning with her service as a Judge of the Family Court from 2012 to 2022. She also served as an Acting Supreme Court Justice in Rockland County starting in 2014 before her election as a Justice of the Supreme Court for the Ninth Judicial District in 2023. Her influence was deeply embedded in the Rockland County legal community, where she oversaw thousands of cases involving family disputes, child custody, and divorce—areas of law where judicial discretion is paramount and the potential for bias is most damaging to the parties involved.
ANATOMY OF AN IMPROPER SOCIAL NETWORK: THE “PUNTA CANA PARTIERS”
The core of the judicial misconduct charges against Justice Eisenpress involved the cultivation of a close-knit social circle consisting of the judge, several prominent matrimonial attorneys—including Amy M. Eisenberg of Eisenberg Yellen, LLP—and senior court staff. This group engaged in extensive international travel and used private communication channels to share confidences, which were never disclosed to the litigants appearing before the judge.
From 2019 to 2024, Justice Eisenpress was a participant in several group text message chains with names such as “Punta Cana Partiers,” “Bougie B*tches,” and “Queen Dara and Her Loyal Subjects.” These threads were used to discuss social and travel plans, but they also served as a repository for gossip, memes, photos, off-color jokes, and “sexually graphic images.” Amy Eisenberg—Susan Yellen’s law partner—was a core member of these group chats. The participation of a sitting judge in such communication channels with practicing attorneys is a direct violation of the Rules Governing Judicial Conduct (22 NYCRR Part 100), which require a judge to act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary.
The investigation identified at least six major trips taken by the judge and members of this social group between 2019 and 2024. In 2019, the group traveled to Punta Cana for attorney Siobhan O’Grady’s birthday, where Eisenpress shared a room with attorney Christine Wienberg. From 2021 to 2023, the group took annual vacations to luxury Vidanta resorts in Mexico. As a paid member of the Vidanta vacation club, Justice Eisenpress handled the room reservations for her travel companions—including Amy Eisenberg—giving them access to discounted rates. All expenses were initially charged to the judge’s room, and the attorneys reimbursed her pro rata afterward. This arrangement created a recurring financial link where the judge served as a financial facilitator for Eisenberg and others while they simultaneously litigated cases in her courtroom.
CASE ANALYSIS: THE IMPACT OF AMY EISENBERG’S FAVORITISM IN MATRIMONIAL LITIGATION
The consequences of these relationships were not merely theoretical. The Commission on Judicial Conduct identified 55 specific cases where Justice Eisenpress presided over matters involving her close social friends without disclosing the relationship or recusing herself, in direct violation of 22 NYCRR § 100.3(E)(1).
Amy M. Eisenberg of Eisenberg Yellen, LLP was one of the most frequent participants in the judge’s social circle. Between 2019 and January 2025, Justice Eisenpress presided over at least 18 cases where Eisenberg served as counsel. In 17 of these cases, the judge made no disclosure of their shared international travel, their membership in the private text groups, or their intimate social friendship. The failure to disclose is critical because it deprives the opposing party of the right to seek recusal or to be aware of potential bias. In the high-conflict environment of matrimonial law, the perception that one attorney has a “backstage” relationship with the judge can be devastating to the litigants’ trust in the process.
Consider the position of the opposing litigants in those 18 cases. Every one of them walked into Justice Eisenpress’s courtroom believing they would receive a fair hearing. They had no idea that the attorney across the table—Amy Eisenberg—had just been texting with the judge on a group chat called “Bougie B*tches,” or that they had recently shared a vacation at a luxury Mexican resort. Amy Eisenberg knew. The judge knew. And Susan Yellen—Eisenberg’s own law partner—either knew or was willfully blind. The litigants were the only ones in the dark.
A particularly egregious instance occurred in 2022 during a matrimonial matter involving attorney Lisa Zeiderman. While the case was pending, Justice Eisenpress failed to disqualify herself despite the fact that Zeiderman was co-hosting a fundraiser at her home for the judge’s 2022 campaign. Two other attorneys for the plaintiff, Ashley Kersting and Siobhan O’Grady, were also the judge’s “friends and traveling companions.” The judge issued an unsolicited order granting Zeiderman’s client temporary custody before defense counsel learned of the fundraiser and sought her disqualification.
THE INTERNAL CONFLICT: DARA WARREN AND DAVID WARREN
The investigation also uncovered a systemic failure to manage conflicts within the judge’s own chambers. From 2016 to 2025, Justice Eisenpress presided over 41 cases involving the law firm of Rosenblatt Warren LLP, where her principal law clerk, Dara Warren, is married to partner David Warren.
Ethical rules require that if a court attorney’s spouse appears before a judge, the judge must disclose the relationship and “insulate” the court attorney from any involvement in those cases. However, Justice Eisenpress failed to disclose the relationship in approximately 30 of these cases and failed to implement any insulation protocols. Dara Warren was not only the spouse of the appearing counsel but was also a member of the “Punta Cana Partiers” social circle. This created a double conflict: a professional familial conflict and a social conflict. In 2024, Justice Eisenpress even denied a formal request to disqualify herself from a case involving David Warren, only stepping aside later for unrelated reasons.
THE CASE AGAINST SUSAN G. YELLEN: HYPOCRISY AT THE HEART OF ATTORNEY DISCIPLINE
The most damning and structurally corrosive aspect of this scandal is the role—or rather, the inaction—of Susan G. Yellen, Esq., a member of the Grievance Committee for the Ninth Judicial District. The Grievance Committee is the body responsible for investigating and prosecuting attorney misconduct in Rockland, Westchester, Dutchess, Orange, and Putnam Counties. Susan Yellen simultaneously serves as the co-founding partner of Eisenberg Yellen, LLP, where her partner is Amy M. Eisenberg—the very attorney who was a primary actor in the Eisenpress scandal, appearing in 18 cases before the judge without disclosure.
Let that sink in. Susan Yellen sits on the committee that decides whether attorneys should be disciplined, suspended, or disbarred. Her own law partner, Amy Eisenberg, was part of a scheme—whether intentional or reckless—that enabled Justice Eisenpress to preside over 18 cases with undisclosed conflicts of interest, depriving litigants of their fundamental right to an impartial tribunal. And Yellen either knew about her partner’s intimate social relationship with the judge and said nothing, or she was so utterly disengaged from her own law firm that she failed to notice what was happening under her own roof. Neither explanation is acceptable for someone entrusted with policing the ethics of other attorneys.
- The Staggering Hypocrisy
Susan Yellen occupies a position of extraordinary authority. Members of the Grievance Committee have the power to issue private Letters of Caution or Admonition, or to file formal charges that could end an attorney’s career. Yellen has, by virtue of her position, participated in decisions that have suspended and disbarred attorneys—destroying careers, reputations, and livelihoods—for ethical violations that may be far less serious than what her own law partner, Amy Eisenberg, did for years.
Consider the rank hypocrisy: an attorney in Yellen’s district could face discipline for failing to disclose a minor social acquaintance with a judge. Meanwhile, Yellen’s own law partner was traveling internationally with a judge, sharing group texts containing sexually explicit content, and appearing in 18 cases before that same judge—without a single disclosure. How can any attorney in the Ninth Judicial District take the Grievance Committee seriously when the person adjudicating their fate is in business with someone who was at the center of the worst judicial ethics scandal in the district’s history?
The answer is: they cannot. And they should not. Susan Yellen’s continued involvement with the Grievance Committee is an insult to every attorney who has been disciplined under her watch, every litigant who has trusted the system to be fair, and every member of the public who believes that those charged with enforcing ethical standards should themselves be beyond reproach
- Yellen’s Ethical Obligations Under the Rules of Professional Conduct
Under Rule 8.3(a) of the New York Rules of Professional Conduct, an attorney who knows that another attorney has committed a violation of the Rules that raises a substantial question as to that attorney’s honesty, trustworthiness, or fitness shall report such knowledge to an appropriate authority. Amy Eisenberg’s conduct—participating in an intimate social circle with a judge before whom she regularly appeared, traveling with the judge internationally, participating in group chats involving “sexually graphic images,” and failing to ensure that the judge disclosed their relationship in 17 of 18 cases—unquestionably raises a “substantial question” about Eisenberg’s fitness. This is not a gray area. This is the kind of systemic ethical failure that Rule 8.3 was designed to catch.
As Eisenberg’s law partner and co-founder of their firm, Susan Yellen was uniquely positioned to observe Eisenberg’s behavior. The social media evidence of the improper ties between Eisenberg and Eisenpress—including vacation photos posted on Facebook by Eisenberg—was public knowledge for years. If a stranger on the internet could have discovered this relationship, how is it possible that Eisenberg’s own law partner—a person who shares office space, clients, and revenue with her—did not know?
Yellen either knew and failed to report (a violation of Rule 8.3), or she was willfully ignorant of the conduct occurring within her own law firm (raising questions under Rule 5.1, which requires law firm partners to make reasonable efforts to ensure that all lawyers in the firm conform to the Rules of Professional Conduct). Either scenario is disqualifying for a person who holds a position on the committee responsible for disciplining other lawyers.
- Rule 8.4 and Conduct Prejudicial to the Administration of Justice
Rule 8.4(d) prohibits a lawyer from engaging in conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice. Susan Yellen’s failure to act—her silence in the face of her own partner’s involvement in a judicial corruption scandal—is itself prejudicial to the administration of justice. By failing to report, failing to recuse, and failing to resign her committee position, Yellen has created an environment where the public can reasonably conclude that the Grievance Committee protects its own. This is precisely the kind of structural corruption that erodes public trust in the legal system.
Furthermore, Rule 8.4(c) prohibits conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresentation. If Yellen participated in any Grievance Committee proceedings involving attorneys connected to the Eisenpress circle—or if she failed to disclose her conflict when such matters arose—her silence constitutes a misrepresentation by omission. The members of the Grievance Committee, the Appellate Division that appointed them, and the public they serve all have a right to know that one of their members is in business with a central figure in the scandal.
- The Structural Impossibility of Impartial Oversight
Even if Susan Yellen were to recuse herself from any specific vote involving Amy Eisenberg, the structural conflict remains. As a member of the Committee, Yellen interacts with staff, influences culture, and shapes institutional priorities. If a litigant from one of Amy Eisenberg’s 18 cases before Justice Eisenpress were to file a grievance against Eisenberg, that complaint would be processed by the very committee on which Yellen sits. The staff who investigate the complaint work alongside Yellen. The other members who vote on the complaint serve alongside Yellen. The notion that Yellen’s mere “recusal from a specific vote” would cure this conflict is naive at best and dishonest at worst.
Organizations like the Center for Judicial Accountability (CJA) have explicitly alleged that the Ninth Judicial District’s disciplinary apparatus has been compromised by insider relationships and institutional self-protection. The Yellen–Eisenberg nexus is the most vivid illustration of this problem. It is not merely an appearance of impropriety. It is a structural impossibility of impartial oversight.
ADDITIONAL CODE OF JUDICIAL CONDUCT VIOLATIONS
Beyond the violations already identified by the Commission on Judicial Conduct, the following provisions of the Rules Governing Judicial Conduct (22 NYCRR Part 100) were violated but have not been adequately addressed:
- § 100.1 — Requirement to Observe High Standards of Conduct
22 NYCRR § 100.1 provides that every judge shall observe high standards of conduct so that the integrity and independence of the judiciary may be preserved. Justice Eisenpress’s participation in group chats containing “sexually graphic images” with attorneys who appeared before her represents a wholesale abandonment of this standard. This was not a single lapse in judgment. It was a sustained, multi-year pattern of behavior that demonstrated contempt for the obligations of judicial office.
- § 100.2(A) — Promoting Public Confidence in the Judiciary
22 NYCRR § 100.2(A) requires that a judge act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary. The very existence of the “Punta Cana Partiers” group—and Eisenpress’s role as its financial organizer—is a per se violation of this provision. Public confidence cannot survive the revelation that a judge was planning luxury vacations with attorneys who appeared in her courtroom.
- § 100.2(B) — Prohibition on Social Relationships Influencing Judgment
22 NYCRR § 100.2(B) provides that a judge shall not allow social or other relationships to influence the judge’s judicial conduct or judgment. The 55 undisclosed cases—18 involving Amy Eisenberg alone—are the clearest possible evidence that social relationships did influence, or at minimum created the appearance of influencing, the judge’s conduct.
- § 100.3(B)(1) — Faithfulness to the Law
22 NYCRR § 100.3(B)(1) requires that a judge be faithful to the law and maintain professional competence in it. By systematically ignoring the recusal and disclosure requirements of the very rules she was sworn to uphold, Justice Eisenpress demonstrated a knowing and willful unfaithfulness to the law governing her own conduct.
- § 100.3(C)(2) — Supervision of Court Staff
22 NYCRR § 100.3(C)(2) requires that a judge shall require staff and court officials to observe standards of fidelity and diligence. By including her principal law clerk, Dara Warren, in the social circle and failing to insulate Warren from cases involving Warren’s spouse, Justice Eisenpress not only failed to supervise her staff but actively drew them into the web of conflicts.
- § 100.4(A)(2) — Lending the Prestige of Office
22 NYCRR § 100.4(A)(2) provides that a judge shall not lend the prestige of judicial office to advance the private interests of others. By using her Vidanta vacation club membership to secure discounted rates for Amy Eisenberg and other attorneys, and by serving as the financial organizer for their travel, Justice Eisenpress leveraged the social capital that attached to her judicial status to benefit attorneys who appeared before her. This is a textbook violation of § 100.4(A)(2).
- § 100.4(C)(3)(b)(iv) — Use of Judicial Office for Fundraising
22 NYCRR § 100.4(C)(3)(b)(iv) prohibits a judge from using or permitting the use of the prestige of judicial office for fundraising. The fact that attorneys who were the judge’s close social friends hosted a fundraiser at their home for the judge’s 2022 campaign—while those same attorneys had pending cases before her—is a clear violation of this provision.
ETHICAL ANALYSIS: AMY EISENBERG’S INDEPENDENT LIABILITY
While much of this report focuses on the judicial misconduct of Justice Eisenpress and the hypocrisy of Susan Yellen, it is essential to address the independent ethical liability of Amy M. Eisenberg herself. Eisenberg is not merely a passive beneficiary of a judge’s favoritism. She was an active, knowing participant in a system of undisclosed conflicts that corrupted the judicial process for years.
Under Rule 8.4(d), Eisenberg’s conduct was prejudicial to the administration of justice. She appeared in 18 cases before a judge with whom she traveled internationally, exchanged sexually explicit messages, and maintained an intimate personal friendship—all without disclosing the relationship to opposing counsel or the court. She did not merely fail to correct the judge’s omission; she benefited from it. Every case where Eisenberg appeared before Eisenpress without disclosure was a case where the opposing party was denied fundamental due process.
Under Rule 3.3 (Candor Toward the Tribunal), Eisenberg had an affirmative obligation to disclose material facts to the court when necessary to avoid assisting the court in a fraud upon opposing parties. The systematic nondisclosure of her relationship with the judge—across 18 separate cases over six years—was not an oversight. It was a pattern of deception by omission.
Under Rule 1.7(a) (Conflict of Interest), Eisenberg’s personal relationship with the presiding judge created an ongoing concurrent conflict of interest in every case she litigated before Justice Eisenpress. Her clients were entitled to know that their attorney had a personal relationship with the judge. Her failure to disclose this conflict to her own clients may constitute an additional, independent violation.
THE NECESSITY FOR INVESTIGATION AND REMOVAL OF SUSAN YELLEN
The findings of this report support the following conclusions and demands:
First, Susan G. Yellen must be removed from the Grievance Committee for the Ninth Judicial District. Her continued presence on the committee is an affront to the attorneys and litigants of the Ninth Judicial District. She cannot credibly sit in judgment of other attorneys’ ethics when her own law partner was a central participant in one of the most egregious judicial ethics scandals in New York history.
Second, an independent investigation must determine whether Yellen used her position to shield Amy M. Eisenberg or Eisenberg Yellen, LLP from disciplinary complaints related to the Eisenpress scandal.
Third, the investigation must determine the extent to which Yellen was aware of her partner’s participation in the “Punta Cana Partiers” group and shared international travel with a presiding judge. If Yellen knew, she violated Rule 8.3 by failing to report. If she did not know, she violated Rule 5.1 by failing to supervise the conduct occurring within her own firm.
Fourth, the Grievance Committee must account for whether it summarily ignored or “whitewashed” complaints filed against the attorneys in Eisenpress’s social circle between 2019 and 2025. If any such complaints were received and dismissed without adequate investigation, Yellen’s role in that dismissal must be scrutinized.
Fifth, Amy M. Eisenberg herself must face a full disciplinary investigation. Her appearance in 18 cases before a judge with whom she maintained an undisclosed intimate social relationship is not a minor ethical lapse. It is a sustained pattern of conduct prejudicial to the administration of justice under Rule 8.4(d), a conflict of interest under Rule 1.7(a), and potentially a violation of Rule 3.3 (Candor Toward the Tribunal).
CONCLUSION: THE EISENPRESS-EISENBERG-YELLEN NEXUS MUST BE DISMANTLED
The resignation of Justice Sherri L. Eisenpress was not a localized event but a symptom of a deeper ethical malaise in the Rockland County legal community. The evidence of improper social intimacy, financial intermingling, and failure to disclose conflicts is exhaustive and supported by a multi-year record of misconduct.
But the scandal does not end with the judge’s resignation. It extends directly into the office charged with policing the attorneys who enabled it. Susan G. Yellen holds the public’s trust to police attorney ethics. Her partnership with Amy M. Eisenberg—a woman whose improper ties to a judge led to that judge’s permanent removal—creates an undeniable, irreparable conflict of interest. It is, in the most literal sense, the fox guarding the henhouse.
Whether Susan Yellen actively shielded her partner, passively looked the other way, or was merely too negligent to notice what was happening in her own law firm, the result is the same: her position on the Grievance Committee is untenable. Every attorney who has been disciplined under her watch has the right to ask: “How can this committee judge me when one of its own members is in business with an attorney who helped corrupt a Supreme Court Justice?”
That question has no satisfactory answer. The only appropriate response is Yellen’s immediate removal and a full, independent investigation into the Eisenberg–Yellen–Eisenpress nexus. The integrity of the disciplinary system—and the public’s faith in the rule of law—demands nothing less.
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