How do judges of the New York Court of Appeals reach the bench?

The court's current selection method is gubernatorial appointment.

New York Court of Appeals / Joined 1986 / Served to 1993

Stewart Freeborn Hancock Jr.

Judge, New York Court of Appeals

Stewart Freeborn Hancock Jr. was a Judge of the New York Court of Appeals, who joined the court in 1986. He previously served on the New York Appellate Division. Opinions & record ↓ Sources ↓

Born: 1923 · age 103
Tenure: 1986–1993 · 7 yrs

Judicial service

Year	Court	Appointed by	Vote
1977	New York Appellate Division	–	–
1986	New York Court of Appeals	–	–

Education

United States Naval Academy
Cornell University

Judicial Record

In our data, Hancock authored 225 published opinions for the court (1977–1993), plus 75 dissents and 17 concurrences. Most cited: Society of Plastics Industry, Inc. v. County of Suffolk (1,369 citations).

Published, precedential opinions from the CourtListener corpus. Counts and rankings are objective and recomputable: how we count. We describe the record, not the judge. 310 of these were attributed to Hancock by a unique court-, date-, and surname-match against our roster (marked ), because CourtListener recorded no author for them. Each links to the official text to verify. How we match.

Selected opinions

Year	Case	Citation	Cited
1991	Society of Plastics Industry, Inc. v. County of Suffolk· Dissent†	77 N.Y.2d 761	1,369
1987	People v. Alvino· Dissent†	71 N.Y.2d 233	1,030
1992	Thoreson v. Penthouse International, Ltd.†	80 N.Y.2d 490	872
1993	Morris v. New York State Department of Taxation & Finance†	623 N.E.2d 1157	862
1987	People v. Alejandro†	70 N.Y.2d 133	811
1991	Rocovich v. Consolidated Edison Co.†	78 N.Y.2d 509	750
1993	People v. Fiumefreddo	626 N.E.2d 646	635
1993	People v. Outley†	80 N.Y.2d 702	545
1986	People v. Sinistaj†	67 N.Y.2d 236	544
1990	D'Arata v. New York Central Mutual Fire Insurance†	76 N.Y.2d 659	425
1987	People v. Buford†	69 N.Y.2d 290	424
1988	Gillman v. Chase Manhattan Bank, N. A.†	73 N.Y.2d 1	384
1987	Sabetay v. Sterling Drug, Inc.· Concurrence†	69 N.Y.2d 329	365
1988	People v. Ingram†	71 N.Y.2d 474	352
1990	Mercury Bay Boating Club Inc. v. San Diego Yacht Club· Dissent†	76 N.Y.2d 256	338

Showing the 15 most-cited of 317 authored opinions in our data. “Cited” is inbound citations across the CourtListener corpus. Case links open the ruling’s full text (CourtListener) or its page here; read the methodology and verify against the primary source.

Questions & answers

How do judges of the New York Court of Appeals reach the bench?: The court's current selection method is gubernatorial appointment.
Which court was Stewart Freeborn Hancock Jr. on?: Stewart Freeborn Hancock Jr. was a Judge of the New York Court of Appeals.

Sources

Each fact on this page traces to a primary public record.

How we source & reconcile data → Data & Sources

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7 years on the New York Court of Appeals. Data as of 2026-03-31. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).