Nichelle Johnson Censured

Nichelle A. Johnson, a Mount Vernon City Court judge in Westchester County, New York, was censured by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct for a pattern of misconduct between 2022 and 2024. The Commission found Johnson initiated improper ex parte communications in pending cases without making required disclosures, and attempted to secure favorable outcomes for friends and acquaintances — including dismissing a neighbor's traffic ticket. In one instance presiding over a landlord-tenant dispute, Johnson personally called the tenant to direct her to pay her landlord "quickly" to avoid eviction; the landlord's attorney objected on the record that it was improper for the court to call a litigant to give her legal advice. The Commission also found that on multiple occasions in 2023, Johnson was impatient, undignified, and discourteous while presiding over criminal matters, and demonstrated bias or the appearance of bias against prosecutors. Johnson agreed to the censure, acknowledged her conduct was improper, and pledged to take extra care to meet her ethical obligations going forward.