KAREN BROWN received her Bachelor of Arts Degree, Magna Cum Laude, in Criminal Justice from Seton Hall University and her Juris Doctor Degree from Rutgers University School of Law, Newark, NJ. After graduating from Rutgers Law School, Karen served as a public interest lawyer at the former Passaic County Legal Aid Society where she engaged in litigation on behalf of public housing tenants. She has also served as an Assistant County Counsel for the County of Passaic where she engaged in civil litigation, participated in hearings before the Office of Administrative Law, conducted departmental hearings involving employee disciplinary actions, defended the county against claims of discrimination filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and drafted resolutions, ordinances, contracts and lease agreements.

Karen has also served as the Passaic County Adjuster where she arranged and participated in civil commitment hearings for county residents receiving mental health services from psychiatric hospitals throughout the State of New Jersey. Karen has served as the President of the Camp Hope Commission and as a Commissioner of the Passaic County Board of Social Services. Karen served as member of the Board of Social Service's personnel committee where she negotiated union contracts, contracts for outside consultants and approved the hiring of civil service and non-civil service employees. Karen also served on the Board of Directors of the Paterson Education Fund, an organization whose mission is to ensure that all Paterson children achieve high standards. Karen has represented the Paterson Education Fund as amicus curiae in Abbott litigation filed by the Education Law Center.

Karen recently served as Of Counsel to a firm which served as Special Counsel to the East Orange Board of Education. Karen defended the board against employee claims of workers' compensation and was responsible for drafting pleadings, conducting discovery, motion practice and trial/settlement. Karen worked closely with the Board's third-party insurance administrator from the inception of the case until resolution. Karen also served as a municipal public defender for the Borough of Roselle representing indigent defendants charged with violations of motor vehicle and traffic laws, disorderly persons' offenses and other non-indictable offenses.

Karen has also served in the elected constitutional office of Passaic County Clerk. In that capacity, Karen handled the day-to-day operations of several divisions of the department which included the County Clerk Division the Registry Division and the Elections Division. Karen handled all personnel matters, media relations, annual filings of financial disclosure statements by government officials, OPRA requests and drafted bid specifications for products and services. As an election official, Karen was responsible for accepting nominating petitions for county-wide office, determining the validity of objections to petitions, preparing and printing all ballots for the election, processing vote by mail applications, tabulating election results, and certifying the election results to the State of New Jersey.

Karen currently serves as the Chief Presiding Judge for the Passaic Municipal Court and as a Judge of the Paterson Municipal Court. She is licensed to practice law in the State of New Jersey, State of New York and before the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey.