Families Say DiDomenico Ditched GOP Values for a Marxist-Style Family Court Regime
By Richard Luthmann
Staten Island once trusted Judge Catherine DiDomenico as a tough, no-nonsense Republican jurist molded by the Guy Molinari machine.
But twenty years later, families trapped in her courtroom say something changed — and not for the better. They describe a judge who abandoned neutrality, ignored evidence, punished innocence, and wielded state power like a political weapon.
“It feels like she made the Mamdani turn,” said one litigant. “You walk into that court, and it’s like the rule of law is gone. It’s like walking through the Gates of Hell.”
Two explosive cases now raise one disturbing question: Did Judge DiDomenico go bad?
Catherine DiDomenico Went Bad: Eight Years, No Trial, No Justice
Staten Island father Marcello Roque says his eight-year custody saga under Judge Catherine DiDomenico’s Integrated Domestic Violence (IDV) Court has been a show trial without rights. He alleges DiDomenico colluded with prosecutors to protect his abusive ex, Irina Spickina, and pre-judge him before he ever spoke. In open court, DiDomenico even admitted she secretly asked District Attorney Michael E. McMahon to drop domestic violence charges against Spickina.
Justice DiDomenico is close to the McMahons. As recently as Justice Judy McMahon’s retirement party a few days ago, a glazed-eyed DiDomenico was lamenting that she was “passed over” by Republican Party leadership for an elected judgeship, in a room predominantly filled with Democrats.
Probably with good reason.
“They had coordinated to bury the charges, protect my abuser, and trap me in the Title IV-D machine,” Roque wrote.
From day one, Roque says, innocence was punished.
“Without a trial, without evidence, I was branded guilty and stripped of my child in a single day,” Roque said.
DiDomenico turned his first hearing into a three-hour inquisition. She even ordered him to haul his one-year-old baby through freezing cold to court – not for any emergency, but “to satisfy a judge’s intoxication with her own power,” according to the scorned father.
Roque brought evidence to defend himself, but DiDomenico scoffed: “I don’t take documents until there is an evidentiary hearing.”
Yet when Spickina launched into hearsay accusations, “suddenly rules didn’t matter. Favoritism did,” according to Roque.
Roque produced a video of Spickina’s violence.
In that courtroom, Roque claims, the facts were flipped upside down. His ex and her lawyer even smeared his autistic teen son—who helped care for the baby—as “dangerous” to gain leverage.
“What a cowardly, immoral move… And Judge DiDomenico allowed it,” Roque fumes.
The judge gave those lies airtime while dismissing Roque’s documented proof. Meanwhile, the court-appointed guardian for the child was literally caught “dozing off in court. Sleeping, while a child’s life was being dismantled”. That lawyer brushed off the little girl’s bruises as “imaginary”, mocking the father’s pleas.
Roque was stripped of his rights and ordered into supervised visits, drug tests, and parenting classes – all on unproven allegations.
“No evidence. No findings. Just her word… Compliance was never the goal – control was”, he says.
He later unearthed a bombshell: two days before his first hearing, DiDomenico had already signed an order siccing child services on him, digging into his life and even his other kids from earlier relationships.
Roque believes that the Title IV-D-driven ACS order has nothing to do with protecting children and families and everything to do with keeping the federal money pipeline flowing into New York’s “sick” family court system.
“This was not the law. This was not justice. This was pre-judgment,” Roque said, saying the ACS outcome was rigged from the start.
He calls DiDomenico “the judge, the jury, and the executioner, all in one” – a tyrant in robes who violated every due process guarantee.
“That day, despite no crime, no abuse, no conviction, I was stripped of due process and parental rights. My daughter… was effectively kidnapped by unconstitutional state intervention”, Roque recounts.
Security officers escorted him out like a criminal as his toddler cried. Eight years later, he still has no trial and little hope.
“Eight years of innocence stolen — by the very court sworn to protect her,” he writes, describing his daughter’s lost childhood.
In a final act of desperation, Roque even lugged a life-sized mannequin into court, covered with photos of his daughter’s bruises – a visual scream for justice he “forced into the courtroom” after years of being ignored. He’s begged for an end to this nightmare.
Instead, he says, Judge DiDomenico enabled it every step of the way, turning a father’s fight for his child into a “Kafkaesque ordeal of power, prejudice, and pain.”
Catherine DiDomenico Went Bad: Cancer Patient vs. Judge-Protected Squatter
In a separate Staten Island drama, an ailing cancer patient’s family accuses Judge DiDomenico of overstepping her bounds to protect an estranged wife who’s made their lives hell. The 38-year-old father – himself a member of the press – spoke on condition of anonymity, invoking New York’s Shield Law to protect his identity.
He’s battling stage IV cancer, yet he’s also locked in a legal war with his soon-to-be ex-wife. While he endures chemo, his wife lives rent-free in his elderly parents’ home – and they can’t get her out. The senior citizen parents want to sell the house and cash out “before everything goes to sh-t under Mamdani.”
The parents went to Supreme Court to evict their daughter-in-law, but DiDomenico improperly intervened. DiDomenico wrapped the separate ejectment case in with the unrelated matrimonial action and “made a mess of things.”
“I’m fighting for my life, and now I have to fight my own judge,” the husband said, his voice trembling. “My wife is squatting in my parents’ house, not paying a dime, and Judge DiDomenico won’t let them evict her so they can retire in peace. My kids will always have a roof over their head.”
According to him, DiDomenico had no authority over the property dispute – yet she meddled anyway, effectively freezing the eviction, leaving the property sale in limbo, and causing the property’s value to hemorrhage since earlier in the year.
“She stuck her nose where it didn’t belong,” he fumed. “Now my folks are stuck with a squatter in their home, I’m stuck paying her bills, and they’ve lost almost $100K in property value.”
In DiDomenico’s court, the divorce has stalled endlessly – but she’s already ordered the husband to pay child support to that very wife living off his family. The cancer-stricken dad calls it “surreal and cruel.” He describes dragging himself from chemotherapy to court, only to watch the judge side with the woman who abandoned him.
“My parents are in their 60s – this stress is killing them too,” he said. “We begged the court for help. Instead, DiDomenico blocked us at every turn.”
The family says DiDomenico’s interference has trapped them in limbo: the wife remains in the house rent-free, the divorce remains unresolved, and an already sick man is being bled dry. They’re outraged that a judge would bend over backwards for a freeloader.
“It feels like the law doesn’t care about us – I’m sick, my parents are old, and she’s letting my wife bleed us dry,” the husband vented.
To him, DiDomenico has betrayed fundamental fairness.
“She’s supposed to be a judge, not some tyrant picking winners,” he said.
This family’s ordeal may be different from Roque’s. Still, the theme is chillingly similar: Judge DiDomenico, they insist, has abandoned neutrality to favor someone they see as in the wrong – leaving an innocent family to suffer.
Was this judge once a protector of family values, now bending the law to shield a shameless squatter?
The cancer patient, also an investigative reporter, has one word for what he’s living through: “Nightmare.”
Catherine DiDomenico Went Bad: From GOP to Radical Left, a Judge Gone Rogue?
How did a stalwart Republican judge become the center of these firestorms?
Catherine DiDomenico built her career in Staten Island’s conservative circles, at the knee of Guy Molinari. She ran for Staten Island District Attorney on the Republican label in 1999. DiDomenico was appointed to the bench by then-Republican Mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2006 and later reappointed by Democrat Bill de Blasio in 2017.
But families like Roque’s say that somewhere along the line, DiDomenico went rogue. They paint her as an authoritarian enforcer of a new, extremist orthodoxy in family court.
“The courtroom was never about the truth. It was about money, incentives, and control,” Roque wrote, describing how “behind closed doors, prosecutors dropped charges, judges flipped custody, and court-appointed attorneys dismissed child abuse as ‘imaginary.’”
He believes the system had a financial agenda – citing federal Title IV-D incentives that reward the state for aggressive child support enforcement. In his eyes, DiDomenico wasn’t applying blind justice; she was serving the machine. Indeed, he accuses her of turning his case into a showcase for bias – punishing a father to enrich the system and empower his abuser.
Critics say DiDomenico’s hardline behavior fits a disturbing pattern. New York’s political and judicial winds have shifted far left, even in once-red Staten Island. Today, a Democratic Socialist sits as NYC’s mayor-elect – Zohran Mamdani, a proud DSA member.
Is Judge DiDomenico aligning with this radical wave, forsaking her old principles? Court watchers note that what once would be unthinkable in a GOP-leaning judge – ignoring evidence of abuse, trampling due process – now appears alarmingly routine.
They see a Marxist-style ideology seeping into family court: one that views traditional families with suspicion, empowers accusers without proof, and uses the levers of state power to humble those deemed “privileged.”
We asked the NYS Office of Court Administration for clarity, as Justice DiDomenico cannot respond to inquiries under the Canons of Judicial Ethics. OCA ignored press inquiries, a pattern that has become increasingly common of late. Many say OCA’s failures to respond to press inquiries signal an increasing authoritarian slide in New York’s already troubled, politically partisan court system. Here is what we asked:
From: Richard Luthmann <richard.luthmann@protonmail.com>
Date: On Tuesday, December 2nd, 2025 at 3:50 PM
Subject: Request for Comment: Allegations Involving Justice Catherine DiDomenico
To: AHackel@nycourts.gov <AHackel@nycourts.gov>, lchalfen@nycourts.gov <lchalfen@nycourts.gov>, press@nycourts.gov <press@nycourts.gov>
CC: Rick LaRivière <RickLaRiviere@proton.me>, Dick LaFontaine <RALafontaine@protonmail.com>, Modern Thomas Nast <mthomasnast@protonmail.com>, Michael Volpe <mvolpe998@gmail.com>, Richard Luthmann <rluthmann@flgulfnews.com>, richard@nynewspress.com <richard@nynewspress.com>Dear NYS Office of Court Administration Press Department,
My name is Richard Luthmann, and I am an investigative journalist and editor with NYNewsPress.com, TheFamilyCourtCircus.com, and other publications. I am preparing a detailed report concerning allegations raised in multiple Staten Island family court matters overseen by Justice Catherine DiDomenico of the Supreme Court, Richmond County.
Two separate families — including one litigant publicly identified as Marcello Roque and a second family whose identities are being protected due to medical and safety concerns — have made serious allegations of judicial misconduct, prejudgment, procedural irregularities, and inappropriate interference in parallel proceedings. These allegations include, but are not limited to:
1. Claims that Justice DiDomenico issued investigative and directive orders before any appearance by a litigant, suggesting prejudgment of the case.
2. Statements made in open court purportedly acknowledging off-the-record communications with the Richmond County District Attorney’s Office, involving decisions to dismiss or decline domestic violence charges.
3. Allegations that relevant evidence, including photographs of injuries and medical reports, was disregarded or excluded, while unverified accusations were given substantial weight.
4. A claim from a second family that Justice DiDomenico improperly interfered in a separate Supreme Court ejectment action, despite the property owners not being parties to the matrimonial case, effectively blocking the lawful removal of a non-tenant occupant from their home.
5. Claims that litigants were denied due process, including the right to a trial, evidentiary hearings, or presentation of witnesses.
Given the seriousness of these allegations and Justice DiDomenico’s long-standing role in the Integrated Domestic Violence (IDV) Part, I respectfully request comment and clarification on the following:
1. Does the Office of Court Administration have any comment on the allegations that Justice DiDomenico engaged in prejudgment or issued orders prior to litigant appearances?
2. Can OCA confirm whether off-the-record conferences between Justice DiDomenico and the Richmond County District Attorney’s Office occurred in the matters referenced?
3. Does OCA have any response to the claim that a Supreme Court Justice in the Matrimonial Part intervened in a separate ejectment action involving third-party property owners?
4. Is Justice DiDomenico currently the subject of any internal review, complaint, or inquiry related to her conduct in these cases?
Please advise if you prefer that specific docket numbers or document excerpts be provided.
I am planning publication shortly and would appreciate any comment the Office may wish to offer. If we go to press prior to your response, we will include your comments in a follow-up. Note that OCA has historically ignored requests from other independent reporters from affiliated outlets and from me.
Thank you for your attention to this matter!
Regards,
Richard Luthmann
Writer, Journalist, and Commentator
Tips or Story Ideas: (239) 631-5957
richard.luthmann@protonmail.com
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We do not expect to hear back from OCA with respect to Justice DiDomenico’s actions, which is a shame becaue Justice DiDomenico deserves a voice (other than political cocktail party whispers), and voters deserve to hear official responses to legitimate governmental critique. If OCA responds, we will publish their position in a follow-up.
DiDomenico, once a law-and-order Republican, is now being celebrated by the hard left for rulings that devastate fathers and reward what some call bad actors. Has she genuinely undergone a political conversion, or is she simply clinging to power by riding the prevailing political tide?
Either way, the results are devastating for those in her courtroom.
The cancer patient’s family and Roque alike describe DiDomenico’s court as Orwellian – where saying you’re a victim makes you one, where fathers are presumed guilty, and where a judge wields unchecked power to engineer outcomes. They fear that DiDomenico has effectively become part of a punitive, radical-left family court regime, answerable to no one.
If a once-conservative judge can turn into what Roque calls a “judge, jury, and executioner”, what does that say about the system at large? Did Catherine DiDomenico abandon her values to join an ideological crusade?
In the end, a haunting question remains – has Judge Catherine DiDomenico gone bad, betraying the very justice she once swore to uphold?
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