Governor's Pick for Chief Justice; Something for Everyone?
Here's the first post written by the new addition to Archer Norris' appellate team, Gary A. Watt.
As you have probably heard by now, Chief Justice Ronald George made a surprise announcement last week; he is retiring. And now Governor Schwarzenegger has nominated Third District Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye for chief justice. Cantil-Sakauye, 50 years old and wife of a police officer, has been a justice on the Court of Appeal for the past 5 years. If confirmed, she would give the Supreme Court some firsts. She would be the first Asian-American chief justice (Cantil-Sakauye is of Filipino descent) and the court would have its first ever female majority.
Since the announcement, Cantil-Sakauye has gained the public support of Chief Justice Ronald George as well as Third District Presiding Justice, Arthur Scotland. Known as a moderate republican or a law and order republican, Cantil-Sakauye's resume includes stints as a prosecutor, municipal/superior court judge (14 years), and deputy legal affairs secretary and deputy legislative secretary under Governor George Deukmejian. The daughter of farm workers, Schwarzenegger called Cantil-Sakauye "a living example of the American Dream."
Of course, intense scrutiny will follow the nomination. For those of you interested in her judicial opinions, you might start with the following from among her nearly 75 published opinions: People v. Memory (2010) 182 Cal.App.4th 835 (reversing murder convictions due to admission of irrelevant, improper character, and prejudicial evidence of defendants' relationship to notorious motorcycle gang); Bledsoe v. Biggs (2008) 170 Cal.App.4th 127 (upholding teacher layoffs despite less-qualified teachers remaining on the job as permitted by the Education Code); and Shaw v. People ex rel Chiang (2009) 175 Cal.App.4th 577 (striking down Legislature's appropriation of $1.2 billion from California's gas tax in attempt to service bond debts).
