Deborah H. Karalunas

Deborah H. Karalunas is an American judge serving on the trial level New York Supreme Court in Onondaga County. She has been a justice on that court since being elected in 2002, and in 2023 she became the first female Administrative Judge for the 5th Judicial District of the New York Supreme Court (still holding that position as of July 2024). She has been the President of the Association of Justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, and received that association's Justice Martin J. Evans Award for Judicial Excellence and Leadership, among other awards during her career.

Judicial service In 2002, Karalunas was elected as a trial level New York Supreme Court justice in the 5th Judicial District, which includes Herkimer, Jefferson, Lewis, Oneida, Onondaga and Oswego Counties. Karalunas sits in Syracuse, Onandaga County, New York. In 2007, she was appointed as the presiding justice in the New York Commercial Division of Onondaga County, a specialized business court.

On July 10, 2023, while still serving as a business court judge in the Commercial Division, she was appointed Administrative Judge of the 5th Judicial District by New York's Chief Administrative Judge Joseph A. Zayas, succeeding Judge James P. Murphy. Karalunas was the first woman ever appointed to this position. At the time of her original election to the 5th Judicial District in 2002, she was only the third woman to hold that position. She is on the faculty of the New York State Bar Association's Young Lawyers Trial Academy. Association of Justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New York's Justice Martin J. Evans Award for Judicial Excellence and Leadership (2022) Public Service Honoree of the Armenian Bar Association (2018) Inaugural Karen DeCrow Award from the Central New York Women's Bar Association, which honors those advancing the principle that civil rights are human rights that should be extended to all (2017) Syracuse University College of Law Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award (2019)

Positions Karalunas has held the following positions, among others;

President of the Association of Justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New York Chair, 5th Judicial District Women in the Courts Committee President, Board of Directors for the Central New York Women's Bar Association Member, New York State Committee on Pattern Jury Instructions