On July 11, 2023, President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. nominated Judge Karoline Mehalchick to be a District Judge for the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. Her nomination was confirmed by the United States Senate on January 31, 2024. President Biden signed her commission on February 5, 2024, and she was sworn in as a District Judge on February 6, 2024. Prior to her confirmation as a District Judge, Judge Mehalchick served the court as a United States Magistrate Judge for over a decade, having been appointed by the judges of the United States District Court to that position in July 2013. With that appointment, she became the first woman judge to sit in the Scranton vicinage of the Middle District of Pennsylvania. She was reappointed to the position for a second term in 2021 and appointed Chief Magistrate Judge in January 2021. In her decade as a magistrate judge, Judge Mehalchick presided over, served as a referral judge, or acted as a settlement officer in thousands of civil, criminal, and petty offense matters.
Judge Mehalchick is a graduate of the Schreyer Honors College of the Pennsylvania State University, and the Tulane University School of Law in New Orleans, Louisiana, where she was a Tulane Law Scholarship recipient and student attorney in the Environmental Law Clinic. Upon graduating from law school, she served as a law clerk to the Honorable Trish Corbett, the first woman judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Lackawanna County. After completing her clerkship with Judge Corbett, Judge Mehalchick joined the law firm of Oliver, Price & Rhodes in Clarks Summit, where she became a partner in 2008.
In addition to her regular judicial duties, Judge Mehalchick has served on the Judicial Conference Committee on Codes of Conduct, as a member of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts Magistrate Judges Advisory Group and is a member of the Third Circuit Judicial Council’s Reentry Courts and Workplace Conduct committees. Within the Middle District of Pennsylvania, Judge Mehalchick helped create the Prisoner Litigation Settlement Program and presides over the Scranton vicinage’s CARE court, the district’s reentry program. Judge Mehalchick currently sits as Jurist in Residence at Widener Commonwealth Law School for the 2025-2027 term, and teaches as an adjunct professor there as well.
Judge Mehalchick is an active member of the Federal, Pennsylvania, and Lackawanna Bar Associations. Judge Mehalchick currently serves as President of the Federal Bar Association. Judge Mehalchick is also a Past President of the Middle District of Pennsylvania Chapter of the FBA. Since September 2018, Judge Mehalchick has served as Vice President of Production for the Ballet Theatre of Scranton. She also participates in weekly Scholar Exchanges through the National Constitution Center, leading middle and high school students in discussions about constitutional issues and civil discourse.
Throughout her legal career, Judge Mehalchick has been recognized for her contributions to the bar and community and is a recipient of the PBA’s Michael K. Smith Excellence in Service Award, the LBA’s Margaret P. Gavin Award, which is presented to an outstanding young lawyer member of the Lackawanna Bar Association who is dedicated to service to the bar and community. Judge Mehalchick was recognized in 2012 as one of thirty-five Pennsylvania “Lawyers on the Fast Track” by The Legal Intelligencer, and in May 2020, the PBA’s Commission on Women in the Profession as a “Woman Trailblazer.”