§ 24-8-215 - Eligibility for benefits -- Retirement generally.
24-8-215. Eligibility for benefits -- Retirement generally.
(a) Any active member with a minimum of ten (10) years of credited service may voluntarily retire upon reaching sixty-five (65) years of age or thereafter upon filing a written application with the Board of Trustees of the Arkansas Judicial Retirement System.
(b) Any other member who has a minimum of twenty (20) years of credited service may retire regardless of age, and any judge or justice who has served at least fourteen (14) years shall be eligible for benefits upon reaching age sixty-five (65).
(c) (1) Any judge or justice who becomes seventy (70) years of age during a term of office to which he has been elected may complete the term without forfeiting his rights to retirement benefits under this section.
(2) (A) Any judge or justice who is not eligible to retire at age seventy (70) may continue to serve as judge until the completion of the term of office in which he receives sufficient credited service to retire without losing his retirement benefits.
(B) The judge or justice shall lose all retirement benefits if he serves beyond the end of the term needed to get sufficient credited service to retire.
(3) (A) Otherwise, judges or justices must retire by their seventieth birthday or lose their retirement benefits.
(B) However, any active judge or justice who was serving prior to July 1, 1965, may continue to serve until any age and shall, upon retirement, be eligible to receive retirement benefits.
(d) In all cases of age and service retirement for judges or justices elected after July 1, 1983, the member must have a minimum of eight (8) years of actual service as a justice of the Supreme Court or a judge of the circuit or chancery courts or of the Arkansas Court of Appeals.
(e) The provisions of this section shall be accumulative to all present laws pertaining to the retirement of judges of the circuit and chancery courts and of justices of the Supreme Court and shall in no way repeal, amend, or modify such laws except as otherwise specifically provided in this section.