Newsom appoints 18 superior court judges

Gov. Gavin Newsom named 18 new superior court judges on Thursday. Most of the 10 women and eight men will sit in courts in Los Angeles County and in the Central Valley.

The group fits the pledge by Newsom and other recent governors to diversity the bench. More than half the new judges are Asian, Black or Latino. Three are in their 60s, six are in their 50s and one is under 40. Thirteen are Democrats.

The appointees include five current or former deputy district attorneys, including three from Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon’s office.

Gascon has been locked in a much publicized battle with many of his deputies since being elected last fall. He’s aggressively pursued changes he touted in his campaign, including refusing to file certain types of charges. This has led to court challenges to his policies and a nascent recall campaign. The Daily Journal could not verify if any of the three have played any role in the disputes with Gascon.

Alfred A. Coletta, 65, has served in multiple roles with the Los Angeles district attorney’s office since 1988. He also spent time with the Los Angeles County Counsel’s office. Warren Masami Kato, 59, and Susan Ser, 50, have both been with the office since 1999.

Newsom also named five people with experience in public defender offices. The Los Angeles court will get Lowynn Y. Young, 52, who has been a deputy public defender since 1998. She attended Loyola University New Orleans College of Law. According to the Judicial Council’s most recent monthly judicial vacancy report, the Los Angeles court has 13 openings, the most in the state by far.

The other big winner was Sacramento County, which saw Newsom fill four of its five vacancies. Experience in private practice and state government characterized this group.

George A. Acero, 45, has been in solo practice since 2016. Before that, he spent eight years with Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani LLP, five of them as a partner. Jonathan R. Hayes, 45, has been with Dreyer Babich Buccola Wood Campora LLP for his entire career, starting as a clerk in 2000. He made partner in 2013.

Dena M. Coggins, 42, has been an administrative law judge at the Office of Administrative Hearings since 2015, aside from a stint as a supervising attorney and hearing officer at the California Victim Compensation Board from 2017 to 2018. She’s also worked as an associate at two major firms, Downey Brand LLP and Morrison & Foerster LLP between 2007 and 2013. From 2013 to 2015, she was a deputy legal affairs secretary to Gov. Jerry Brown.

Augustin R. Jimenez, 67, has been deputy general counsel at the California State Transportation Agency since 2013. He served in several legal positions at the Business, Transportation and Housing Agency from 1999 to 2013. He also spent years in private practice and as a legislative analyst for the city of Los Angeles and an assistant city attorney in Seattle.

Several other inland counties will also get new judges. This includes two in historically underserved San Bernardino County. Candice A. Garcia-Rodrigo, 38, has been a court commissioner in neighboring Riverside County since 2018. She has also worked in several private firms and as an adjunct professor at the University of La Verne College of Law.

Douglas Kent Mann, 56, will also join the San Bernardino court. He has been a partner at Walker & Mann LLP since 2007. He is the lone Republican in the group.

Ryan I. Wells, 40, will join the Fresno Court after serving as a senior deputy district attorney in the county since 2012. He also worked as a deputy district attorney in Contra Costa County and was a legal editor at LexisNexis from 2009 to 2010.

The San Joaquin County Superior Court will get Erin E. Guy Castillo, 40. She’s been a commissioner with the court since 2018. Castillo was a partner with Parish Guy Castillo PC from 2014 to 2018 after working in a predecessor firm since 2009.

Marcus L. Mumford, 51, will join the Stanislaus County court after 20 years in the county public defender’s office.

Orange County will get two new judges, both current court commissioners.

Isabel Apkarian, 44, was recently named a commissioner after working in the public defender’s office from 2003 to 2020. Carmen R. Luege, 62, has been a commissioner since 2009. She was an assistant U.S. attorney for the Central District of California from 1992 to 2009.

Jennifer Jean O’Keefe, 43, joins the Monterey Court after more than a decade with the public defender’s office, most recently as chief deputy. She has been a professor at the Monterey College of Law since 2015.

Jessica M. Delgado, 52, has been named to the Santa Clara County court. She was with the county’s alternate defender’s office since 2009 and was a deputy public defender from 2001 to 2009.

Troye Kendall Shaffer, 47, joins the Sonoma County Court, where she’s served as a commissioner for two years. She joined the district attorney’s office in 2000, rising to chief deputy in 2015.

Four of the new judges will fill positions allocated under a budget deal between Newsom and state legislators in 2019. SB 95 funded 25 of the 48 remaining judge positions the state approved more than a decade before but didn’t fund.