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A New Jersey judge who continued as administrator of a client's estate for 13 years after rising to the bench filed an answer to the ethics complaint charging her with violating three canons of the Code of Judicial Conduct.

In a formal complaint issued in January, Judge Mary F. Thurber of Bergen County Superior Court was accused of breaching a rule barring judges from being administrators or executors of an estate, except for a member of the judge's family. She was retained as administrator of Isabelle McKinley's estate in 1998 and remained in that role after her judicial appointment in 2009, according to the complaint by the Advisory Committee on Judicial Conduct. Thurber remained in that role until she was discharged in April 2022, the complaint said.