State Supreme Court veteran to become chief justice's top aide

By John Roemer

Daily Journal Staff Writer

SAN FRANCISCO - A veteran state Supreme Court staff lawyer whose father was a prominent
Los Angeles trial judge will be the new principal attorney for Chief Justice Tani
G. Cantil-Sakauye, the court announced last week.

Cantil-Sakauye introduced Carin T. Fujisaki as her new top aide at a Beverly Hills
Bar Association meeting Tuesday. The chief joked that she had stolen Fujisaki from
the chambers of now-retired Justice Marvin R. Baxter.

Fujisaki, who has been with the court since 1990 and was most recently a Baxter staff
attorney, will assume the post formerly held by Beth J. Jay.

Jay, who retired in 2012, served as principal attorney to three chief justices over
a 33-year career and was widely viewed on her exit as having become one of the most
influential attorneys in the state.

Fujisaki, as an "elbow clerk" who worked closely with Baxter, for years the court's
leading conservative, helped draft and review conference memoranda on petitions for
review in civil, criminal and administrative law cases.

The politics of the boss, of course, are not necessarily those of the clerks. Jay
is a Democrat who served three Republican chiefs including Cantil-Sakauye. Fujisaki's
political affiliation is unknown, but her father was a public defender and she once
led a feminist revolt against UCLA's perceived bias in sports funding, a move that
led her to law school.

Her new job looks beyond the cloistered realm of opinion-writing toward the broader
vista of the court's place in the state's legal firmament.

Fujisaki will counsel Cantil-Sakauye on administrative and policy issues and serve
as the high court's link to the State Bar, the State Bar Court and the Commission
on Judicial Performance.

"The principal attorney functions as the chief's liaison to the governmental world
outside of the court, working in an administrative rather than a judicial capacity,"
said a former high court senior staff attorney, Dennis Peter Maio, now a Reed Smith
LLP counsel.

"She needs to be smart and politic. Carin suits the role to a T."

Fujisaki said in a statement, "I look forward to supporting the chief justice's 3D
Access and civic engagement initiatives, contributing to improvements in the administration
of justice in the judicial branch and increasing access to justice for all Californians."

The chief justice's 3D access plan, introduced in 2013, aims to keep courts open,
increase electronic filing and augment translation services.

Cantil-Sakauye said in the media statement, "Carin is a prime example of the wealth
of legal talent and the dedicated public servants who staff our Supreme Court."

She is the daughter of Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki, who
was interned with his parents in the Manzanar relocation camp during World War II.

  <p/> 
  Now retired, he was widely credited with conducting the O.J. Simpson civil trial in
  1996 in an atmosphere of calm civility that contrasted with the fireworks of Simpson's
  murder trial. 
  <p/> 
  In a 2007 Daily Journal interview, Carin Fujisaki said she and Tia G. Fisher, now
  a Los Angeles trial judge, were on the UCLA Bruins women's rowing team. Fujisaki was
  one of the team's coxswains, typically the small person who sits in the stern, motivating
  and coordinating those pulling the oars. 
  <p/> 
  She received the school's outstanding athlete award in 1981 and led the gold medal
  winning team at the U.S. National Sports Festival. 
  <p/> 
  Fujisaki said she and Fisher confronted the UCLA athletic department about its Title
  IX compliance once they learned their team was less well funded than the men's. 
  <p/> 
  "The answers we were given were not very responsive," Fujisaki said. "I think we both
  decided almost at that moment to go into law." 
  <p/> 
  She graduated from UC Hastings College of the Law in 1985. 
  <p/> 
  <a style="color:#123f72;"

href="mailto:johnroemer@dailyjournal.com">johnroemer@dailyjournal.com

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