Cuauhtémoc Ortega

Eleven months ago, when Ortega was named to lead the largest federal public defender’s office in the country, he had been a member of the Central District of California’s defense office for just 10 years. At 38, he was among the youngest top defenders ever appointed.

Now, he oversees 210 employees, including about 90 attorneys who work in the Los Angeles, Santa Ana and Riverside courthouses.

The sprawling district provides what he called “a rich diversity of cases,” including drug trafficking, immigration offenses, gangs and white-collar crime.

Although Ortega spends about 80% of his time on management and administration, he is overseeing two of the office’s most high-profile cases. He is co-counsel for the captain of the Conception, who is facing 34 counts of seaman’s manslaughter from the dive boat’s catastrophic fire in 2019. U.S. v. Boylan, 2:20-cr-00600 (C.D. Cal, filed Dec. 1, 2020).

And he is overseeing the team defending former L.A. City Councilman José Huizar on bribery and racketeering charges. U.S. v. Huizar, 2:20-cr-00326 (C.D. Cal, filed July 30, 2020).

One of his goals in the top post is to increase the “technical fluency” of everyone in the office, which he says is important for everything from discovery to trial presentations. Even in comparatively straightforward cases, these days “everyone has a smart phone” and information discovered from phones can prove useful.

He took on another goal soon after his appointment by setting up a social services support unit. “That’s a very new thing” in the federal system, he said.

The unit’s three clinical social workers and one psychologist help attorneys’ clients with needs such as housing and mental health and substance abuse treatment. They also assist at sentencings, he said.

Ortega originally joined the office with almost no criminal law experience after a year as a law clerk for U.S. District Judge Alicemarie H. Stotler and a year as a litigation associate at Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP. He credits good mentors for his success, including Amy Kalin, who heads the Orange County branch. He strives to be one now himself.

“The part I love most about managing is mentoring new staff lawyers,” he said. “It’s what draws me to these leadership positions, trying to help other people find their own voices.”

— Don DeBenedictis