Hellerstein Rejects Trump Immunity Claims Days Before Maduro Arraignment
The senior Manhattan judge, who died at 92, handled high-profile cases for nearly 30 years, including the 9/11 litigation and a 2025 trial involving BNP Paribas.
By Carmen Wojcik ·
Alvin K. Hellerstein, a senior federal judge in Manhattan, has died at age 92.
Chief Judge Laura Taylor Swain confirmed the passing on Wednesday morning. She stated that Hellerstein died surrounded by family and described him as a distinguished jurist who provided energetic and dedicated service to the court until his final days. His funeral is scheduled for Thursday at Riverside Memorial Chapel in Manhattan.
Hellerstein maintained a heavy docket despite moving to senior status in 2011. Two weeks before his death, he presided over the arraignment of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. He added torture charges to their existing narco-terrorism conspiracy case. Maduro had been captured in a US military raid in Caracas in January. When Maduro twice refused to enter a plea, Hellerstein intervened, stating that a not-guilty plea would be entered on his behalf. He had scheduled the trial for June of next year.
In August, Hellerstein issued a ruling that rejected President Trump’s attempt to move his hush money case to federal court. This marked the third time the judge denied such a request. The first denial occurred after Trump’s March 2023 indictment, and the second followed the May 2024 conviction and a subsequent Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity. In his August opinion, Hellerstein wrote that paying hush money to an adult film star was not subsumed in presidential immunity. The case centered on a $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels.
Hellerstein’s legacy includes decades of work on lawsuits stemming from the 2001 World Trade Center attacks. He presided over dozens of wrongful death and property damage cases for twenty years. In March 2010, he rejected a proposed settlement of at least $575 million for people who fell ill from toxic ash. He explained that while most settlements are private, this case was different because it involved 9/11. He also ended a 2008 effort to force New York City to keep searching for human remains in a Staten Island landfill.
Other notable cases on his docket included the criminal trials of Charlie Javice and Bill Hwang. Javice was convicted last year of defrauding JPMorgan Chase of $175 million, while Hwang was convicted in 2024 of securities fraud. In 2025, a jury ordered French bank BNP Paribas to pay nearly $21 million for giving the Sudanese government access to the US financial system during atrocities. In 2015, Hellerstein ordered a New York cable company to pay a Texas woman $229,500 for sending her 153 robocalls.
Barry Pollack, Maduro’s lawyer, said his team was saddened by the news and offered condolences. Analisa Torres, the judge taking over the Maduro case, served on the Manhattan state bench before joining the federal bench in 2013. She was also part of an international monitoring delegation for Venezuela’s 2006 presidential election.
