Retired Franklin County Judge Carol Van Horn has earned Juniata College’s Alumni Achievement Award. Juniata College’s mission is to empower students to lead a fulfilling life of service and ethical leadership in the global community following their graduation.
A 1979 Juniata graduate, Carol Eichelberger Van Horn the award that honors those who have distinguished themselves over a period of years; and who have achieved a pinnacle position in their chosen profession.
Van Horn graduated magna cum laude from Juniata in 1979; then received her Juris Doctor degree in 1982 from Dickensen School of Law.
Van Horn began her career in law by serving as law clerk to the Honorable John W. Keller in Fulton and Franklin counties in Pennsylvania. She later entered into private practice, specializing in domestic relations, real estate, and estate administration and went on to practice law in Franklin County for nearly 20 years.
She was elected to the bench for the 39th Judicial District in 1999. The district encompasses both Franklin and Fulton counties. She won retention for a second 10-year term in 2009, becoming President Judge in 2015.
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Van Horn’s accomplishments
Carol spearheaded the effort to establish a treatment court for those with opioid dependency issues involved in the criminal justice system in Franklin County.
She presided over Good Wolf Treatment Court from its beginning in April 2017 through her retirement in January 2020. As a retired judge, she serves as a Senior Judge, eligible for assignments by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Following her appointment by former Gov. Ed Rendell in 2009, Carol served as a member of the Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Committee as part of the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency for 12 years. Former Gov. Tom Corbett appointed her to the Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission (JCJC) in 2012. She was Vice-Chair when her term ended in 2021.
Carol was a lecturer and panelist for the Pennsylvania Bar Institute in areas involving family law, estate administration, and juvenile court. She chaired the JCJC’s Juvenile Delinquency Benchmark Committee from 2016-2019, overseeing the revision of this resource for all Common Pleas judges. Van Horn served on the Domestic Relations Procedural Rules Committee from 2011-2015 upon appointment by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. She previously served on the State Roundtable dealing with dependency issues in juvenile matters; and she was a member of its Dependency Benchmark Committee.
Van Horn was recognized with the Judge Richard J. Walsh Criminal Justice Advisory Board (CJAB) Award in 2019 as chair of Franklin County’s CJAB from 2015-2019. She was the recipient of the Sylvia H. Rambo Award from the Penn State Dickinson School of Law in 2010; the Chambersburg YMCA Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008; the Franklin County Athena Award in 1999; the Chambersburg 2000 Partnership Award in 1998; and the “Women on the Move” award given by the Hagerstown Publishing Company in 1994.
