Sandra L. Townes

Born in Spartanburg, South Carolina, the Honorable Sandra L. Townes graduated from Johnson C. Smith University with her Bachelor of Arts degree in 1966 and later from Syracuse University College of Law with a Juris Doctor in 1976.

Following law school graduation, Townes worked with the Onondaga County, New York, District Attorney's Office as Assistant district attorney from 1977 to 1983. She was promoted to Senior assistant district attorney from 1983 to 1986 and became Chief assistant district attorney from 1986 to 1987. Townes was elected to a City Court Judge seat for the City Court of Syracuse, New York, from 1988 to 1999. In 1999, Townes was elected as Justice of the Fifth Judicial District New York Supreme Court 2000 to 2004 and was selected by the New York State Governor, George Pataki, to the judicial post of Appellate Division Associate justice handling appeals for the 2nd Judicial Department of the New York State Supreme Court from 2001 to 2004. During this time Townes also taught academically as an Adjunct professor at Syracuse University College of Law from 1987 to 1995 and at Onondaga Community College from 1992 to 2001.

Townes was nominated to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York by President George W. Bush on August 1, 2003 to a seat vacated when the Honorable Sterling Johnson, Jr. took senior status. Townes was confirmed by the Senate on June 3, 2004 on a Senate vote and received her commission on August 2, 2004. She assumed senior status on May 1, 2015, serving in that status until her death of lung cancer at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan, New York on February 8, 2018.[2]

• Sandra L. Townes at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.