Who is Wendy Pew, the judge who dismissed charges against ex-Philly police officer Mark Dial?

The Philadelphia judge who dismissed all charges this week against Mark Dial — the now-former police officer who fatally shot Eddie Irizarry during a traffic stop in Kensington — sparked outrage with her decision, with protests erupting in Center City and lawmakers lobbing criticism from City Hall.

But lawyers who have appeared before Municipal Court Judge Wendy L. Pew say the 56-year-old is a generally even-keeled, straightforward judge who has spent more than 20 years on the bench.

She is the daughter of a prominent casino magnate, the late Arthur M. Goldberg, who was president of a company that operated gambling houses under brand names including Bally’s, Caesars, and Hilton. And for a time, Pew was married to a man whose relatives had founded the Sun Oil Co. and the Pew Charitable Trusts, the Philadelphia-based nonprofit policy behemoth.

Pew did not respond to a request for comment Friday. Here’s more about who she is:

Pew — then Wendy Lynn Goldberg — graduated from a prep school in North Jersey, the Pingry School in Basking Ridge, before attending Hamilton College, in upstate New York, according to a 1989 wedding announcement published in the New York Times. She later attended the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, the Times said, but graduated from Villanova’s law school.

Pew passed the Pennsylvania bar in 1992. She then clerked for a federal judge for a year, worked at the Center City firm Cozen O’Connor for a year, and then worked at Independence Blue Cross until being appointed to the Philadelphia bench in 2000 by then-Gov. Tom Ridge, a courts spokesperson said. In a 2001 Inquirer article, the then-34-year-old Pew, who was running for retention, said she had a “good judicial demeanor and temperament.”

“As a general rule, I try to start court on time and often sacrifice lunch to allow my afternoon list to start timely,” she said. “I am also courteous and respectful toward everybody in my courtroom, which seems to keep the flow of the cases running smoothly.”

In 2002, Pew participated in Community Court, a program through which judges sought to connect defendants accused of minor crimes with social workers, counselors, or drug treatment.

“People don’t just get lost in the system here,” Pew told Daily News columnist Elmer Smith at the time.

In more recent years, Pew, as a Municipal Court judge, has been ruling on preliminary hearings, where prosecutors must show that they have sufficient evidence for cases to proceed to trial. The cases before her have included charges of murder and assault and in some instances have led to unusual hearings.

In 2011, she and two staffers held a preliminary hearing in a hospital conference room so that a man who had been badly beaten inside his restaurant could identify his attacker while continuing to receive medical treatment.

And in 2019, she found a murder defendant in contempt of court after he yelled at her and called her a bitch when she ordered him held for trial.

Some lawyers who have appeared before her say she seems inclined to accept testimony by police officers as true. But that’s not unusual at preliminary hearings, where judges are supposed to accept testimony as truthful and not make assessments of credibility.

“If police say ‘X,’ she’ll go with police,” said Samuel Stretton, a veteran criminal defense attorney. “She’s not a pushover. She’s usually a pretty fair judge. She treats everyone with respect, moves her cases [efficiently].”

In 1990, she married Derek Pew, according to a New York Times story after the wedding. Derek Pew at the time worked in finance, the Times said. The charitable trust that bears his family’s name is one of the most influential philanthropies in the country. (The Daily News in 2002 noted Wendy Pew’s connection to the foundation, but said she was “not involved in funding decisions.”)

The couple divorced in 2013, according to court records. Wendy Pew was represented by attorney Walter McHugh — who is now a partner of Dial’s attorneys, Brian McMonagle and Fortunato Perri Jr.

After Pew dismissed charges against Dial, Irizarry’s family expressed concerns about those connections on social media.

Several legal experts, however, said they did not believe the situation represented a conflict for Pew.

“The mere fact that the judge was a client a decade ago of a lawyer who is partners with McMonagle and Perri is not a conflict that would require recusal,” said Lauren Ouziel, a professor at Temple University’s law school.

Stretton, who also has extensive experience representing judges accused of misconduct, agreed. He said Pew could have disclosed that history by mentioning it in court in order to create a record, but he didn’t view that as obligatory, in part because “[McMonagle and Perri’s] firm has appeared before her a million times over the years. No one’s raised any objections.”

Even without that strain of criticism, Pew’s decision to toss the case sparked immediate backlash — from Irizarry’s family members, Black clergy members and the city chapter of the NAACP, and City Councilmember Quetcy Lozada, who introduced a resolution calling Pew’s ruling “erroneous.”

Michael J. Diamondstein, a criminal defense attorney, found that criticism so misguided that he said he sent Lozada a letter in response. In the letter, a copy of which he provided to The Inquirer, he called Lozada’s criticism of Pew “despicable” for its failure to review and consider the evidence presented in court and apply it to the law, as he said Pew did. He called Lozada’s critique a “pandering, Trump-like attack.”

“Judge Pew is a hardworking, honorable, and decent judge who has spent over two decades presiding over cases and dispensing even-handed justice,” Diamondstein wrote. He added: “Using the power of your office to take a shot at a judge for political expediency is beneath the dignity of your office and does a disservice to our city.”

The District Attorney’s Office has appealed Pew’s decision to a Common Pleas Court judge. The fate of Dial’s criminal case will ultimately end up in the hands of one of her colleagues.