A Fireside Chat with

Hon. Robert Kirsch ’91

U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey

Wednesday, March 20, 2024

Fordham Law School

The Honorable Robert Kirsch is a judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey.He was nominated by PresidentJoseph Biden in January 2023 and confirmed by the United States Senate on May 2, 2023. He received his judicial commission on May 8, 2023.

Prior to his appointment to the federalbench, from 2010 through mid-2023, he served as a judge of the New Jersey Superior Court, Union County. Judge Kirsch was initially nominated by Governor Jon Corzine in 2009 and subsequently renominated by Governor Christopher Christie in 2016. He was unanimously confirmed by the New Jersey Senate at both his initial and reconfirmation hearings.

During his tenure on the New Jersey Superior Court, Judge Kirsch served in the Family, Civil, and Criminal Divisions. Upon taking the oath of office, he was first assigned to hear cases involving allegations of child abuse and neglect, including litigation seeking the termination of parental rights. Thereafter, he presided over juvenile delinquency matters, during which he heard and rendered verdicts in over 75 bench trials. While sitting in the Civil and Criminal Parts, Judge Kirsch presided over approximately 75 jury trials.

In addition to serving in various state and local leadership positions relating to juvenile justice, Judge Kirsch initiated a statewide juvenile re-entry program. The program was presented at every youth detention facility in the state serving at-risk youth in all 21 counties of New Jersey. For his work on juvenile justice, he was selected by Family & Children’s Services of Union County as a “Champion for Children” in 2013. On several occasions, he has spoken at the annual Prison Reentry Conference sponsored by former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey, and has actively supported Integrity House, a Newark, New Jersey-based nonprofit organization providing therapeutic substance abuse treatment services to approximately 2,000 individuals each year.

Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge Kirsch served for more than twelve years as an Assistant United States Attorney in the District of New Jersey. In that capacity, Judge Kirsch served for four years in the Civil Division. He then served for more than eight years as a federal prosecutor specializing in sophisticated white-collar fraud, handling a number of high-profile criminal prosecutions. Judge Kirsch tried numerous cases involving complex international and domestic investment and corporate financial fraud schemes, as well as garden-variety prosecutions for drug trafficking, weapons offenses, and theft.

Before his tenure in the United States Attorney’s Office, Judge Kirsch served for four years in the Attorney General’s Honors Program at the United States Department of Justice. As a Trial Attorney in the Department’s Civil Division, he handled complex civil litigation matters on behalf of the United States.

Over his career in public service, Judge Kirsch has received numerous awards and commendations for outstanding performance, including from the Department of Justice, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Postal Inspection Service, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Commodity and Futures Trading Commission.

After graduating with honors from the Fordham University School of Law, Judge Kirsch clerked for the Honorable William H. Zloch of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida. He received his undergraduate degree in Political Science from Emory University, where he graduated magna cum laude.

In June 2015, Judge Kirsch was inducted into the Columbia High School Athletic Hall of Fame as a member of its 1984 championship basketball team.

Notable Cases:

As a United StatesDistrict Court Judge:

CoreCivic, Inc. v. Murphy, No. 23-cv-967, 2023 WL 5556025 (D.N.J. Aug. 29, 2023).

New Jersey enacted a law that prohibited private companies from contracting with the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement to house individuals for civil immigration violations. CoreCivic, the operator of the sole immigration detention facility in New Jersey, joined by the United States, challenged New Jersey’s law under the Supremacy Clause of the United StatesConstitution. Judge Kirsch held that New Jersey’s law was unconstitutional as applied to CoreCivic because it usurped the federal government’s exclusive role in enforcing federal immigration law and impermissibly interfered with the United States control over immigration. New Jersey’s appeal of Judge Kirsch’s decision is currently pending before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.

As a Superior Court Judge:

State v. Carlton Franklin, No. FJ-20-1450-12 (N.J. Super. Ct. Ch. Div. Jan. 31, 2013), aff’d, State in the Interest of C.F., 444 N.J. Super.179 (App. Div. 2016).

As a result of one of the country’s oldest cold-case investigations, the defendant was arrested and charged in mid-2012 with a murder that occurred in early 1976. The victim was the defendant’s 57-year-old female neighbor, who was found hog-tied, bloodied, and beaten in her home. Blood and other bodily fluids were recovered from the victim’s clothes and bedding, but the forensic evidence remained untouched in storage for almost 35 years until an investigator picked the case back up and applied modern DNA analysis to old evidence, resulting in the defendant’s arrest and trial. The defendant was 52 years old at the time of trial but only 15 years old at the time of the offense. Because the applicable 1976 law did not authorize trying a 15-year-old as an adult, the 52-year-old defendant was tried as a juvenile in 2013. Hearing the case as a bench action, Judge Kirsch found the defendant guilty of felony murder and sentenced him to ten years in state prison, which was the maximum penalty authorized by law.

State v. McGillvary, Ind. No. 16-05-344 (N.J. Super. Ct. Law Div. Apr. 24, 2019), aff’d, No. A-4519-18 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. Aug. 4, 2021), cert. denied, 249 N.J. 341 (2021), cert. denied, 142 S. Ct. 1685 (2022).

The defendant, a self-described “internet celebrity” referred to as the “Hatchet Wielding Hitchhiker,” was known for his viral internet postings and appearances on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and The Colbert Report. The defendant was convicted of murdering a 74- year-old man, a lawyer whom police found dead in his home. At trial, the medical examiner testified to the victim’s multiple broken ribs; multiple crushed cervical vertebrae; and an ear that had almost been completely severed from his head. The defendant was arrested at an out-of-state bus depot, preparing to travel to Georgia. After a jury convicted the defendant of murder, he was sentenced to 57 years in state prison.

State v. Powell, Ind. Nos. 12-10-796 and 12-10-797 (N.J. Super. Ct. Law Div. May 30, 2017), aff’d, No. A-1343-18, 2021 WL 2934731 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. July 13, 2021), cert. denied, 248 N.J. 500 (2021).

The defendant was charged with committing a series of aggravated sexual assaults and armed robberies against couples staying in several motels across Elizabeth and Linden, New Jersey. On multiple occasions, the defendant followed couples as they entered their motel rooms and broke into their rooms. At gunpoint, he then forced the individuals to engage in sex acts with each other and with him, robbed them, and then fled the scene. After a two-month trial, the jury convicted the defendant on all 60 charged counts. The defendant was sentenced to 133 years in state prison.

As an Assistant United States Attorney:

United States v. Hoffecker and Myers, Ind. Nos. 03-cr-120(01) and (02), aff’d, 530 F.3d 137 (3d Cir. 2008).

Judge Kirsch served as lead trial counsel in a case that involved the investigation of a major complex international telemarketing fraud, which defrauded United States investors out of more than $20 million. The scheme involvedan offshore central“office” in the Bahamas and approximately ten United States “boiler rooms.” Two three-month trials resulted in convictions of both defendants on all charged counts of conspiracy and mail fraud. Defendant Hoffecker was sentenced to more than seventeen years in prison; Defendant Myerswas sentenced to nine years in prison. The Third Circuit’s precedential Opinion has been cited by several hundred courts, including virtually every Circuit Courts of Appeal.

United States v. Puff, No. 2:09-cr-271.

Judge Kirsch served as lead counselin the investigation and prosecution of more than ten individuals for their roles in a Ponzi and mortgage fraud scheme, which defrauded more than 400 investors and financial institutions out of more than $100 million. The defendants, who were all employed by NJ Affordable Homes Corp., included the company’s lawyers, senior management, and loan appraisers and processors. The company marketed itself as a real estate business that bought, refurbished, and resold residential properties through financing from residents in 30 states, predominantly New Jersey, as well as Sweden, Israel, and countries in the Caribbean. While falsely touting inflated profits, the company in reality operated as a Ponzi scheme. Defendant Puff, the president and owner of NJ Affordable Homes as well as the scheme’s ringleader and mastermind, pled guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and was sentenced to eighteen years in prison.