NEW YORK: A trailblazer black jurist who became the first Muslim woman to serve as a US judge in a high court, was found dead in New York’s Hudson river in Harlem on Wednesday. She was 65.

Sheila Abdus-Salaam’s body showed no obvious signs of trauma and a medical examiner was set to try to determine what killed her. Police sources, however, told New York Post tabloid her death appeared to be a suicide.

Abdus-Salaam, a native of Washington DC, became the first African-American woman appoi­nted to the court of appeals when Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo named her to the state’s highest court in 2013.

“Justice Sheila Abdus-Salaam was a trailblazing jurist whose life in public service was in pursuit of a more fair and more just New York for all,” Governor Cuomo said in a statement.

“As the first African-American woman to be appointed to the state’s court of appeals, she was a pioneer. Through her writings, her wisdom and her unshakable moral compass, she was a force for good whose legacy will be felt for years to come.”

A graduate of Barnard College and Columbia Law School, Ms Abdus-Salaam started her law career with East Brooklyn Legal Services and served as a New York state assistant attorney general, according to the court of appeals website.

She held a series of judicial posts after being elected to a New York City judgeship in 1991, a report said.

The Princeton Encyclopedia of American Political History said Ms Abdus-Salaam was the first Muslim woman to serve as a US judge. She was also the first black woman appointed to the state’s highest court.

AFP adds: Her husband had reported her missing on Tuesday, US media said.Abdus-Salaam was born into a working class family in Washington DC in 1952 and educated at public schools.

While researching her family history as a child she discovered that one of her great-grandfathers had been a slave in Virginia, US media said.

She studied at New York’s Barnard College and Columbia Law School, where she was a classmate of Eric Holder, the first black US attorney general, who served under former president Barack Obama.

Abdus-Salaam began her legal career at East Brooklyn Legal Services, which works against poverty, racial and social injustice, before serving as a lawyer for the New York state government and city’s office of labor services.

She was appointed to the Court of Appeals by Cuomo in 2013.

“Her personal warmth, uncompromising sense of fairness, and bright legal mind were an inspiration to all of us who had the good fortune to know her,” the court said. She lived in Harlem.

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2017