Juan Manuel Merchan is an American judge and former prosecutor. He is an acting justice of the New York State Supreme Court in New York County (Manhattan). He presided over the 2024 criminal trial of former US president Donald Trump, in which Trump was found guilty by the jury. Merchan is the first judge in history to preside over the criminal indictment and a guilty verdict of a US President, and the first judge to hold a President in criminal contempt of court.