At a gala honoring newly elected members of the bench, New York Court of Appeals Chief Judge Rowan Wilson spoke about a more holistic approach to justice. "We don't always have to think of punishing people," Wilson said Monday evening during remarks at the New York State Trial Lawyers Association's inaugural Fall Judicial Gala. "We don't always have to think of this in a moral sense of, 'Here's somebody that did something bad. That's a bad person, we need to punish them.' We may, in many cases, reach a better result by saying, 'What went wrong here?' thinking broadly that each of us may have had some role." Wilson said the location for the event—the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian in lower Manhattan—was an appropriate venue to highlight how different communities think about justice. "The traditional Western system of justice really is focused on who did what, who was hurt, and how are we going to punish them," the judge said. "The traditional Native American system of justice thinks differently—and thinks about what was the injury to the community, and what do we need to do to repair the community." The Chief Judge said this holistic outlook aligned with the way he plans to approach the state's family court system. "We want to be able to provide resources to families who are in distress before they're in distress," Wilson said. "To have resources to be able to provide things that families need, but also to be able to direct them to resources outside of the court system. Because what we're trying to do is to protect and preserve families." Chief Administrative Judge of the New York State Unified Court System Joseph Zayas also addressed the crowd. NYSTLA President David Scher introduced both Wilson and Zayas. Zayas spoke about the importance of collaboration between associations like NYSTLA and the court system to reduce backlog. "Associations like this are an integral part of our mission to make our courts stronger, to reduce case backlogs, to require access to justice, but most importantly, for this association, to reduce delays in moving case cases to trial," Zayas said to applause. "My focus has been increasing the number of trials throughout the city, and throughout the state, so that we can get back to trying cases. [...] I believe that will do more to reduce the backlogs in our state than anything else." The gala, whose planning committee was led by Scher and NYSTLA President-Elect Victoria Wickman, was also known as "Judge Night." "As a newly elected member of the bench, I applaud the trial lawyers for bringing many generations of lawyers and judges together," said Andrea Krugman, a member-elect of the New York City Civil Court. "Judge Night presents a wonderful opportunity for the bench and bar to meet and helps build bridges in the courtroom."