Judge Ariel E. Belen: Professional Background and Legal Expertise

The Hon. Ariel E. Belen (Ret.) was an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Appellate Division, Second Judicial Department. He was designated to the Appellate Division in 2008. Belen retired in 2012.

His judicial career began in 1995 when he became a justice of the Kings County Supreme Court. During his tenure on the Supreme Court, Belen served as a justice of the Commercial Division in Kings County (2002 to 2005), which he is also credited with helping to establish. As a presiding justice of the Division, he handled complex commercial cases. He also served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court, Appellate Term in the Second and Eleventh Judicial Districts (2005 to 2012), and administrative judge of the Kings County Supreme Court, Civil Term (2007 to 2008).

Belen received a B.A. from Brooklyn College in 1978. He went on to earn a J.D. with a specialization in International Legal Affairs from Cornell Law School in 1981.

After law school, Belen joined the Legal Aid Society, where he began as a criminal trial attorney assigned to the Criminal Defense Division. He would later serve as a supervising attorney of the Division (1986 to 1989). Belen then joined the Office of the Corporation Counsel of the City of New York Law Department, first working as an assistant corporation counsel (1990 to 1993) before assuming the position of deputy chief of the Brooklyn Tort Division in 1993. The following year, Belen became chief of the Tort Division of the Bronx Borough Office. He remained in that capacity until assuming the Supreme Court bench.

Belen co-authored the New York Trial Notebook, a trial practice treatise. In addition, he has served as an instructor for the New York State Judicial Institute and is also a frequent lecturer, moderator, and panelist.

His memberships have included the New York State Bar Association, the Hispanic Bar Association, and the Cornell Latino Alumni Association. He is also the founding member of the Cervantes Society.

Belen has served on the Commission to Reimagine the Future of New York’s Courts, the Judicial Task Force on the New York State Constitution, the New York State Grievance Committee for the Second, Eleventh, and Thirteenth Judicial Districts, the Franklin H. Williams Judicial Committee on Minorities (vice-chair), and the Committee on Character and Fitness, Supreme Court of the State of New York, Appellate Division, First Department.

He is fluent in Spanish.

After retiring from the bench, Belen joined JAMS as an international arbitrator and mediator.