Attorneys with the city's Public Defender Service, D.C. Superior Court magistrate judges and one private practice attorney are among the nine nominees selected for consideration to fill three vacancies on the D.C. Superior Court.
The District of Columbia Judicial Nomination Commission announced its picks this morning to fill judgeships left vacant by former Superior Court judges James Boasberg, John Bayly Jr. and Stephanie Duncan-Peters. Boasberg’s seat has been vacant since March 17, Bayly’s since April 22, and Duncan-Peters’ since May 3.
The candidates are being sent to the White House for consideration; President Obama will have 60 days to choose a nominee, who will then be sent to the Senate for approval.
More on the nominees after the jump.
The candidates for Boasberg’s seat include Peter Krauthamer, deputy director of the Public Defender Services; Magistrate Judge John Francis McCabe Jr.; and Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Wingo. They were selected from 34 applicants.
Krauthamer has been with the public defender office since 1983 and previously served as head of the trial division. McCabe, who was appointed in 2002, is also the deputy presiding magistrate judge and the alternative chairperson of the D.C. Commission on Mental Health. Wingo was appointed in 2006 after serving as the Assistant Deputy Attorney General for Public Safety in the city attorney general’s office.
Magistrate Judge Joseph Beshouri, Laura Hankins of the Public Defender Service and U.S. Department of Justice Civil Division Deputy Director Elizabeth Shapiro are up for Bayly’s seat.
Beshouri was appointed to the court in 2009, following a 23-year career as a criminal defense attorney; he is a former instructor with the National Institute of Trial Advocacy at George Washington University Law School. Hankins serves as special counsel to the director and is also the service’s representative on the D.C. Sentencing and Criminal Code Revision Commission. Shapiro has been with the Justice Department since 1991 and previously served as an appellate attorney in the Office of the Solicitor for the U.S. Department of Labor.
The only private practice attorney in the group, Danya Dayson, is among the nominees to fill Duncan-Peters’ seat. The other nominees include Magistrate Judge Karen Howze and Jason Tulley of the public defender service.
Dayson is an attorney with Washington’s O’Toole, Rothwell, Nassau & Steinbach and serves on the Domestic Relations and Paternity and Support Subcommittee of the Family Court Implementation Committee. Howze, a former managing editor for USA Today, was appointed in 2002 and was also elected in 2010 to serve on the Board of Trustees of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges. Tulley jointed the public defender service in 2003 and is special counsel for the director, heading the Forensic Practice Group. He is also vice chairman of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers’ Forensic Science Committee.
There were 31 applicants vying for Bayly and Duncan-Peters' seats.
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