DA Madeline Singas’ ‘big fat Greek inauguration’

Noah Manskar

Madeline Singas couldn’t help calling it her “big fat Greek inauguration.”

His Grace Bishop Sevastianos of Zela of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America gave the invocation at the Jan. 25 ceremony swearing her in as Nassau County’s district attorney, and a contingent of her Greek relatives was in the crowd.

Like Singas’ parents, her aunts and uncles came to the United States from small Greek villages, overcoming many hardships to create better lives for their families, she said.

After addressing her family in Greek, Singas, a Manhasset resident, told the crowd: “The fact that I’m here, and my sister, and all my cousins — we’re proof that this is the greatest country in the world.”

At the inauguration, Singas and the speakers who introduced her indicated her success as Nassau’s top prosecutor was as much a testament to her upbringing and her family’s strength as it was to her more than two decades of experience.

A first-generation American, Singas, now 49, grew up in Astoria, Queens, where her father opened a family pizzeria. Her parents forbade her and her sister, Dr. Effie Singas, from working in the restaurant so they could focus on their studies, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said at Singas’ inauguration.

She was admitted to the Bronx High School of Science, one of New York City’s top high schools. She graduated near the top of her class despite the struggle that came with her mother’s leukemia diagnosis when Singas was 14, Dr. Effie Singas said.

In her “best summation ever,” Effie said, Madeline convinced her father to pay for her Ivy League education at Columbia University’s Barnard College, even though she had a full scholarship to another university.

Her mother was in and out of the hospital during her first three years there, and succumbed to cancer in her junior year.

“Sadly, the woman who was the greatest influence in her life would attend neither her Barnard College graduation, nor her graduation from Fordham (University) law school,” Effie Singas said at the inauguration. “In retrospect, Madeline’s life story, like our parents’, is one of equal fortitude and perseverance.”

Singas proceeded to make her way through the Queens district attorney’s office, eventually leading its Domestic Violence Bureau. Then, in 2006, then-Nassau DA Kathleen Rice, now a congresswoman, tapped her to help start Nassau’s Special Victims Bureau.

In 2011, Rice made Singas her chief assistant DA. She took the helm of the office in January 2015, when Rice took her seat in Congress.

Singas ran as a Democrat to retain her post, beating former Hempstead Town Supervisor Kate Murray, a prominent Republican, by a 16-percent margin in November’s election.

Singas’ father died later in her life.

At the inauguration, she said he didn’t understand why she and her husband, Theo Apostolou, wanted to leave Astoria and move to Nassau County.

When asked why he didn’t want to make the trip east, Singas said, her father said he didn’t want to fight the traffic.

Singas told him then it wouldn’t be an issue, but the traffic the night of the inauguration proved he was still present in some way, she said.

“I often don’t think about them and think about loss,” Singas told the crowd. “I think about how fortunate I was to have two such remarkable people in my life who gave me love and support and nurtured me 1,000 percent, and taught me how to believe in myself, and how to believe in others and trust others.”

In her inaugural address, Singas said courage is the most important attribute a prosecutor can have.

“When I need that courage, those are the times that I reflect upon the fortitude and integrity I was raised with,” she said. “And those are the times that I call upon my 24 years of experience, talking to victims and defendants, defense attorneys and prosecutors, police officers and judges.”

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