HON. ROXANNE BAILIN is a former District Court Judge. Roxanne Bailin was Chief Judge of the 20th Judicial District (Boulder County) from 1998 to 2013. She was named to the county bench in 1983 and to the district court bench in 1987. Prior to being appointed County Judge, Judge Bailin was a Clinical Professor and Director of the Legal Aid and Defender Program at the University of Colorado School of Law. Judge Bailin began her legal career as an attorney with Colorado Rural Legal Services in Trinidad, Colorado. She received a bachelor’s degree in Anthropology from the University of Chicago in 1971 where she was a Trustee Scholar. She received her law degree in 1974 from New York University Law School. As chief judge, Judge Bailin oversaw the administration of the courts and probation in addition to her duties as a district court judge. She currently works as a part-time employee consultant for the National Center for State Courts in the areas of Leadership and Governance, Court Efficiency, and Court Facilities. She also consults with the Colorado State Court Administrator’s Office on drug courts and provides motivational interviewing training for judges on a national level.
HON. SCOTT BALES joined the Arizona Supreme Court in 2005 and became Chief Justice on July 1, 2014. He regularly teaches courses as an adjunct professor at the law schools at Arizona State University and the University of Arizona. He is also a member the ABA’s Law School Accreditation Committee, the Executive Committee of the ABA’s Appellate Judges Conference, and the Council of the American Law Institute.Before his appointment to the Court, he had practiced law in Arizona for nearly 20 years as both a private and public lawyer. From 2001-2005, he worked at Lewis and Roca LLP, where his practice focused on appellate and complex litigation. As Arizona’s Solicitor General from 1999-2001, he handled major appeals in state and federal court, oversaw the enforcement of Arizona election laws, and supervised the preparation of legal opinions on issues concerning state government. Justice Bales also was a Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Policy Development, a federal prosecutor in the United States Attorney’s Office in Phoenix, and a Special Investigative Counsel for the Justice Department’s Inspector General. He clerked for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Joseph T. Sneed III on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. After graduating from Michigan State University with degrees in history and economics, he received a master’s degree in economics and his law degree from Harvard.
HON. JANET E. BARTON, President, NAPCO 2017 is the Presiding Judge for the Judicial Branch of Arizona in Maricopa County (Greater Phoenix), home to 4 million people (60 percent of the state’s population), and the state’s capitol. In her role as the county’s top administrative judge, she oversees 97 superior court judges, 59 court commissioners, and the county adult and juvenile probation departments, as well as 26 justices of the peace and 26 constables. She also has superintendence authority over the 24 municipal courts within the county. Judge Barton was appointed to the bench in July 2000. Over her 16 years on the bench, she has served on each of the Superior Court’s four major departments: three years on juvenile (including two years as that department’s associate presiding judge); five years on civil (including two years as that department’s associate presiding judge and four years as a complex case judge); four and one-half years on criminal (including three and one-half years as a special assignment judge managing capital and complex criminal cases); and two and one-half years on family (including two years as that department’s presiding judge). Judge Barton was also the Associate Presiding Judge of the Superior County in Maricopa County from January 1, 2013 through June 30, 2015. On July 1, 2015, she was designated by the Arizona Supreme Court as the County’s Presiding Judge and began a three-year term in that leadership position. Judge Barton presently serves on the Arizona Supreme Court’s Presiding Judges’ Committee, the Arizona Judicial Council, and the Arizona Commission on Access to Justice. Judge Barton began her legal career in 1985 as a lawyer with the firm of Snell & Wilmer, and in 1991 became a partner in that firm. Her primary area of practice was commercial and state and local tax litigation until her appointment to the Superior Court bench. Judge Barton obtained her undergraduate degree in Accounting from the University of Kentucky in 1975, and her Juris Doctorate from the University of Kentucky College of Law in 1985.
HON. DOUGLAS BEACH, President-Elect 2017, is the Presiding Judge, Twenty-First Judicial Circuit Court of Missouri in St. Louis County. The Circuit includes the county area surrounding the City of St. Louis, the 22nd Circuit Court. The 21st Circuit is the largest general jurisdiction court in the State. Judge Beach was elected by his colleagues as the Presiding Judge in 2016. He was appointed to the Circuit Court in 2010 by Governor Jay Nixon. From 2005 to 2010, he served as an Associate Circuit Court Judge on that Court. As a jurist, Judge Beach worked primarily in the Family Court until becoming the Presiding Judge.Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge Beach served 17 1/2 years as the City Attorney for the City of Chesterfield where he was instrumental in incorporating the City in 1988. In private practice in St. Louis, he was featured in the Best Lawyers of America; is a Fellow of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers; Missouri Bar; Massachusetts Bar; St. Louis County Bar; Past President, St. Louis Metropolitan Bar Association; member of the Women’s Lawyers Association, Hispanic Bar Association and Lawyers Association: Board Member, AFCC; Board Member of Children’s Home Society; Program Committee for Kids in the Middle; received the “Champion of Kid’s Award;” and named Outstanding Young Lawyer, St. Louis County Bar. In 2011, Judge Beach coordinated the effort to pass a $100 million dollar bond issue by the voters of St. Louis County to replace the Family Court Building and renovate the Civil Courts Building. Subsequently, he oversaw the construction of those facilities for the Court. Recently, he was recognized by Legal Advocates for Abused Women and the Crime Victim Advocacy Center, and started the Veterans Treatment Courts in St. Louis County.Judge Beach received his law degree from New England School of Law (Cum Laude) in 1973. He retired from the United States Marine Corps Reserve as a Lieutenant Colonel where he served as Judge Advocate. He is married and has two children, Lindsay and Garrett, and a stepdaughter, Kate.
HON. IVY BERNHARDSON was appointed to the Fourth Judicial District Court bench in May 2007 by Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, and was elected Chief Judge in July 2016. She previously served as general counsel for the Hazelden Foundation and Medica Health Plans. She was a corporate lawyer at General Mills for 22 years, ending as Vice President, Associate General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary. She has served on the boards of many nonprofit organizations including the Bush Foundation and Fairview Health Services. She served as the first woman chair of the Board of Trustees of her undergraduate school, Gustavus Adolphus College. She also practiced law at the Minneapolis firm of Leonard, Street and Deinard. She has served in Family Court, and the Civil and Criminal divisions as well as serving as Assistant Chief Judge for four years. She graduated from the University of Minnesota Law School.
RAYMOND L. BILLOTTE, Vice-President, NAPCO is the Administrator for the Judicial Branch of Arizona in Maricopa County, serving as the senior executive officer for the nation’s fourth largest trial court. Previously, he served as the District Court Administrator in the 5th Judicial District of Pennsylvania (Greater Pittsburgh) from 1996-2012 and the 46th Judicial District of Pennsylvania (Clearfield) from 1985-1992. Mr. Billotte holds a Master’s Degree of Public Management from Carnegie-Mellon University and is a 1991 Graduate Fellow of the Institute for Court Management’s (ICM) Court Executive Development Program. During his tenure with the courts, he has led numerous successful court improvement projects, including caseflow management revisions, jury reform, strategic planning, jail population reduction strategies, and the use of evidence-based practices in both pre-trial and post-adjudicative phases of the criminal justice system. Additionally, he has served as a consultant with USAID addressing criminal justice reforms in the Mexican states of Oaxaca and Chihuahua and has served on numerous state and national court management committees addressing the use of technology in the courts, preservation and transcription of court records, professional development of court managers, and juror diversity. Mr. Billotte is the first Vice President of the newly formed National Association for Presiding Judges and Chief Executive Officers (NAPCO). Prior to his officer position in NAPCO, he was a Board Member of the National Conference of Metropolitan Courts (NCMC) and its Strategic Planning Committee which was instrumental in creating NAPCO. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Justice Management Institute (JMI), a justice system nonprofit consultancy. Previously, Mr. Billotte served on the Board of Directors for the National Association for Court Management (NACM) from 2010-2013. He continues to be active in numerous court management organizations including the Urban Court Managers Network and the Arizona Association of Superior Court Administrators. Mr. Billotte is certified as faculty for the ICM’s Leadership and Visioning & Strategic Planning courses.
GLENN DAVIS retired from the Maricopa County Superior Court bench in 2013 and now has a mediation practice. As a Judge he served rotations on the Civil, Criminal and Family Courts. Prior to being appointed to the bench he was in private practice for 24 years and also served as Counsel to the Arizona State Senate Minority during 10 of his years in private practice. He served as President of the Maricopa County Bar in 2007 and currently serves as President of the Maricopa County Justice Museum and Learning Center Foundation Board.
DON BIVENS is a recent chair of the 55,000-member Section of Litigation of the American Bar Association. He handles complex litigation of all types and corporate investigations. He has tried cases involving securities fraud, patent infringement, trade secrets, lender liability, environmental liability, professional negligence, officer and director liability, products liability, employment discrimination, real estate and construction matters, significant estate disputes, business torts, and class actions. Don leads internal investigations for corporations and special committees of corporate boards on a variety of issues. He also handles election law and government relations.
DAVID BODNEY, ESQ., is a litigator focusing on media and constitutional law, is Co-Practice Leader of the firm’s Media and Entertainment Law Group. Mr. Bodney has defended print, broadcast, and electronic media in defamation, privacy, and related First Amendment litigation. In addition, he has significant experience litigating complex commercial disputes; handling matters involving intellectual property, American Indian law, and governmental affairs issues; and briefing several high-pro file cases in the U.S. Supreme Court. Mr. Bodney’s practice covers a range of constitutional law issues, including prosecuting actions to secure open government, blocking prior restraints and subpoenas of reporters by government and third parties, and handling advertising, commercial speech, intellectual property law, and voting rights issues. In addition, he is regularly called upon to lobby and testify in legislative proceedings involving proposed legislation in a wide variety of issues. Mr. Bodney has co-authored the Arizona sections of the Media Law Resource Center’s 50-State Surorys on privacy and employment privacy law since their inception. He has lectured on media law and litigation at conferences internationally, including presentations on extreme speech, libel, and mass media law in Cambridge, London, and Moscow, respectively.For over 30 years, Mr. Bodney has worked to secure open government legislation on behalf of the publishing industry. In 1999, together with The Arizona Republic, he earned the Arizona Newspapers Association’s Freedom of Information Award for his work in federal court on behalf of PhoenL’C Newspapers, Inc. He co-auth ored a monograph on freedom-of-in fo rma tion laws for the ABA’s Central and East European Law Initiative to assist emerging democracies in the former Soviet Union with the enactment of FOI laws. Mr. Bodney is a former legislative aide to U.S. Sen. John V. Tunney.
KYLE BRYSON is a director of development for the College of Engineering. He assists donors in identifying the areas and programs where their support will enhance Texas A&M’s capability to be among the best universities. Kyle joined the Foundation in March 2014.
HON. DANIEL J. BUCKLEY was appointed to the Los Angeles bench in 2002 by Governor Gray Davis. He became the supervising judge of the civil courts in 2012 after serving as the assistant supervising judge. In January 2015 he became Assistant Presiding Judge and in January 2017 he became Presiding Judge of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County. Judge Buckley has more than 14 years’ experience as a judge with assignments in criminal, limited and general jurisdiction civil, and probate cases.
ELAINE NUGENT-BORAKOVE has more than 25 years of experience conducting research and providing training in both the criminal and juvenile justice systems. Currently, as the President of the Justice Management Institute (JMI), a non-profit organization whose mission is to improve the administration of justice, she leads several national-level justice system improvement efforts including the development of the National Network of Criminal Justice Coordinating Councils, the Urban Court Managers Network, the Rural Court Improvement Network, the Smarter Sentencing Initiative to Reduce Recidivism, and Project Management for the Revision of the NACM Core Competencies. In addition, she is leading JMI’s work with the MacArthur Foundation to help build more just and effective local justice systems as part of the Safety & Justice Challenge. For the Challenge, she led a national study to document the characteristics of highly effective local criminal justice systems that produce meaningful and sustained system change and leads the site coordination efforts in five local jurisdictions to develop and implement jail reduction strategies and address racial and ethnic disparities. She has also served a member of the Evidence-Based Decision Making Initiative consortium and helped develop the framework for evidence-based decision making in local criminal justice systems. Prior to joining JMI, she served as the Director of Research and Evaluation for the National District Attorneys Association where she led efforts to assess prosecutorial workload and effectiveness and to advance the ability of prosecutors to respond to emerging and persistent justice system issues. She has published extensively on the justice system in areas related to prosecution, performance measurement, sexual violence, and criminal justice system coordination.
HON. PAULA M. CAREY was appointed Chief Justice of the Trial Court in July 2013 by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. She had served as the Chief Justice of the Probate and Family Court since October 2007. She was appointed an Associate Justice of the Norfolk Probate and Family Court in 2001. Prior to her appointment to the bench in January 2001, Chief Justice Carey was a partner in the firm of Carey & Mooney, PC, where she specialized in domestic relations matters. She has lectured and authored material for numerous publications and educational programs in the area of domestic relations, both as a practitioner and as a judge. She is a graduate of New England School of Law. Chief Justice Carey is a member of the Massachusetts Bar Association, previously serving on the Family Law Section Council, the Boston Bar Association and Suffolk University Advanced Legal Studies. She is also a member of the Massachusetts Family and Probate American Inn of Court and the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts. During her career she has been honored by organizations including the Massachusetts Bar Association with the Daniel J. Toomey Excellence in the Judiciary Award, the Massachusetts Judges Conference, the Middlesex Bar Association, MCLE, Mass. Association of Women Lawyers and the Mass. Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, the Haskell Cohn Award for Distinguished Judicial Service from the Boston Bar Association in 2013 and was the Dean’s Reception Honoree at New England Law for her commitment to public service and dedication to the law school and its students. Most recently, she received the Greater Boston Fiduciary Law American Inn of Court Award of Excellence and the Mass Judges Conference President’s Award of 2016.
MJ CARTWRIGHT is the CEO of Court Innovations, developer of the Matterhorn platform for online case and dispute resolution. Working with University ofMichigan’s Law Professor J.J. Prescott, MJ leads the Matterhorn team providing meaningful, usable, and fair solutions that expand online and mobile access to ourcourts for all citizens: “go to court” without going to court.MJ builds teams and businesses to develop powerful, disruptive solutions that solveindustry problems, produce irrefutable outcomes, and leverage developing research. She has lead technology initiatives in many different industries including:manufacturing, education and training, healthcare, and medical devices. Now she brings her expertise to the judicial ecosystem – working with courts, other stakeholders, and citizens to implement solutions that directly impact today’s issues. Prior to Court Innovations, she has been the CEO at CNC Connections, Arbor Ultrasound, Edington Associates, and ViaDerm. She has been on the executive andtransition teams at HealthMedia acquired by Johnson & Johnson. She has an MBA from Eastern Michigan University and an BSEE from the University of Michigan.
GLEN DAVIS is a Principal at CFAR, a private management consulting firm with offices in Philadelphia and Boston. CFAR specializes in organizational design, strategy, change implementation, collaboration, and leadership development. We focus on the links between a client’s business system, and the system of human relationships within the organization, blending business analytics with social science insights to help leaders of complex organizations improve performance and productivity. I work across industries with a focus on helping leaders develop their organizations to optimize their work. I co-lead our Pharmaceutical market area and am a member of both the firm’s Collaboration and Campaign Approach to Change practice groups. I have also taught for programs at the Wharton School, and Cornell University ILR, and other executive education programs around the world. I draw on my background as an ethnographer of communication, a documentary filmmaker, and a Ph.D. in Communication from the Annenberg School of the University of Pennsylvania.
JENNIFER CRANSTON is a shareholder at the law firm of Gallagher & Kennedy. Over the past 17 years, she has developed a unique practice spanning three distinct areas of the law: real estate disputes involving condemnation and valuation issues; insurance coverage analysis and bad faith litigation; and public utility regulation. Ms. Cranston has an AV Preeminent Peer Review Rating from Martindale-Hubbell and was recognized earlier this year as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in Arizona by Arizona Business Magazine. She is a Past President of the Maricopa County Bar Association and currently serves as Vice President of the Maricopa County Justice Museum & Learning Center Foundation.
HON. PATRICIA COSTELLO is a part-time consultant with the National Center for State Courts. She retired in February 2015, as the Assignment Judge at the Superior Court of New Jersey in Essex Vicinage, home to the state’s largest general jurisdiction trial court. The Assignment Judge position is similar to a chief or presiding judge in other states. Judge Costello was responsible for all trial courts within the vicinage, including municipal courts which are funded separately by city governments. Newark is headquarters for the Essex Vicinage (a French term meaning district or vicinity used in New Jersey to designate single or multi-county districts administered by an Assignment Judge). There are 15 vicinages and 21 counties in New Jersey. Essex is a single county district. The Superior Court consists of 60 judges and 900 support staff handling more than 100,000 filings per year. The county’s 22 municipal courts conduct their work through 38 judges and have annual filings in excess of 900,000 cases. Following graduation from Rutgers University School of Law, she established the law firm of McAlevy & Costello PC in 1986, noted for its criminal trial work. Judge Costello was appointed to the bench in 1989. She served four years in the Civil Division and as the Supervising Judge of the Special Civil Part while in that Division, was responsible for the management of over 50,000 civil filings per year she handled matters ranging from simple civil disputes to complicated medical malpractice, class action and intellectual property matters. She served five years in the Family Division as the Presiding Judge, overseeing eight judges, and six years in the Criminal Division, and as Presiding Judge of that Division, overseeing eight other judges where she tried numerous jury trials of indictable offenses, including homicides, armed robberies and assaults. She has been active in judicial education for over 15 years, serving as vice chair of the New Jersey Supreme Court Commission on Judicial Education, and has lectured many times to judges and staff on various topics, including case management, team building, leadership, and legal procedure. Judge Costello also is on the Special Advisory Committee for Trial Court Leadership and Governance at the National Center for State Courts and has served as a special consultant on strategic planning, civil and criminal case processing studies involving trial courts in Minnesota, New Mexico, Ohio, and the judicial system in Nigeria as well as faculty for numerous judicial and court management seminars sponsored by the National Center and National Judicial College (Reno, NV) throughout the nation. Aside from her work with the National Center, Judge Costello serves Of Counsel part-time at the New Jersey law firm of Chiesa, Shahinian & Giantomasi PC, a 130-attorney practice specializing in business and public policy law. Her specialties at the firm focus on mediation and arbitration in civil, chancery, and matrimonial matters including probate, commercial litigation, and labor and employment disputes.
BARRY DORNFELD co-leads the Center for Applied Research’s (CFAR’s) Life Sciences and Higher Education Groups. He has been a strategic advisor to organizations in both the nonprofit and for-profit sectors, and is an expert on organizational change, governance, and collaboration. He draws on his many years of consulting, teaching, and industry experience to help guide clients through complex business issues, develop a strategy for change, and to learn from their experience. Barry also teaches extensively, leading workshops on negotiation, board governance, strategy, influence and persuasion, and organizational change, and leading action-learning programs. He speaks to a wide range of groups in many industries with a focus on healthcare, life sciences, not-for-profits, and higher education, and has taught and spoken in many settings in the US and internationally, including extensive experience with Wharton’s Executive Education division. In addition to his academic positions, Barry has presented to a range of client audiences including the Association for Women in Science, the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, the Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals, and the Temple University School of Law. Barry’s experience as an anthropologist and filmmaker trained him to listen and ask questions, so that he can work with executives in ways that are attuned to their needs, culture, and learning styles, and that help them reach their business goals. These skills help him connect to clients easily, work productively in a variety of settings, and effectively advise and teach executives. His recent work in the life sciences and higher education has focused on ways to help organizational leaders maximize value across strategic partnerships such as those with academic medical centers and medical professional societies. The objective of this work is to optimize the investments in these organizational relationships relative to basic research, clinical research and trials, scientific information exchange, marketing, and educational curricula and programming. Barry is co-author of The Moment You Can’t Ignore: When Big Trouble Leads to a Great Future, published by Public Affairs Books in October 2014.
PAUL EMBLEY is NCSC’s Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Director of Technology. Mr. Embley has 30 years of experience focused on managing private sector and government IT projects, including 5 years as NCSC’s CIO. Mr. Embley is responsible for chairing several national projects and programs, including NCSC’s internal Information Technology group, and developing technical standards for the courts. He is the co-chair of the XML Structure Task Force, a member of the National Information Exchange Model (NIEM) Business Architecture Committee (NBAC), and a participant in the DHHS Children, Youth, and Family Services domain. Mr. Embley is frequently asked to evaluate IT systems, recommending organizational changes and process improvements. Prior to joining the NCSC in 2007, Mr. Embley was a valuable resource to many national and international agencies on standards and Information sharing. Among other positions, he served as the Senior Director for Standards at G&H International in Washington, D.C., where he participated in and advised NIEM groups and chaired the NBAC. As a contractor with MSSI/Lockheed Martin, Mr. Embley also successfully led the Commonwealth of Kentucky’s complex Unified Criminal Justice Systems project.
HON. JUNIUS P. FULTON has served as a judge of the Norfolk Circuit Court since 1996. Judge Fulton oversaw the development and implementation of both the Norfolk Drug Court docket and Reentry Court dockets. He claims the distinction of being the longest serving Drug Court judge in the Commonwealth, having presided over the Drug Court docket continuously since 1998. Judge Fulton has chaired or participated in numerous justice system committees, including the Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee, Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission, State Drug Treatment Court Advisory Committee, Virginia Supreme Court’s Special Committee on Problem Solving Dockets, and Circuit Court Judge’s Benchbook Committee. He is also a member of the Virginia and National Association of Drug Court Professionals. As a member of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, Judge Fulton served as an executive member of a task force commissioned to draft key components for reentry court programs. He has lectured on specialized dockets at a variety of conferences including, 2014 Council of State Governments’ Second Chance Act Conference and 2015 Southern Legislative Conference. Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge Fulton served as an Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney for the City of Norfolk and later in the private practice of law representing litigants in a variety of courts in the Commonwealth. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Virginia and received his JD from Marshall-Wythe School of Law at the College of William and Mary.
JILL GOLDSMITH has extensive business savvy, developed from working as a trial lawyer for national and international clients. She also has education and experience in evidence-based counseling. Jill combines this unique experience and education to collaborate with leaders and teams, providing ongoing support and holding leaders and teams accountable in areas that include:strategic planning,communication effectiveness,organizational development and role clarity,time management strategies,conflict management, andleadership styles.Through coaching, leaders and teams become more effective and successful, and organizations grow and thrive. Jill Goldsmith graduated from Washington University in St. Louis with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and from Arizona State University Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. After more than 25 years as a trial lawyer in a national practice, she returned to Arizona State University to earn her Master of Counseling degree. She is a licensed associate counselor (LAC) and a National Certified Counselor (NCC). She is also certified in an emotional intelligence assessment, EQ i-2.0 through Multi-Health Systems and other psychometric assessments. During her career as a trial lawyer, she represented national and international companies, served as managing partner, and served in other leadership roles for the Phoenix office of a national law firm. Jill also serves in leadership roles in several nonprofit organizations.
JOHN GREACEN is currently a principal of Greacen Associates, LLC, Mr. Greacen wrote the seminal article on the difference between legal information and legal advice for court staff in 1995 and continues to publish regularly on the topic. He was editor of the California Benchbook on Self-Represented Litigants and author of the benchbook chapter on judicial ethics. He has made educational presentations on dealing with self-represented litigants in many states and in Canada. Mr. Greacen received the National Association for Court Management Award of Merit in 1999. Mr. Greacen is Project Consultant to the Self-Represented Litigation Network and principal consultant for the Network’s State Justice Institute-funded study of remote delivery of services to self-represented litigants.
GORDON M. GRILLER, Executive Director, Secretary, Chief Financial Officer, is a Principal Court Management Consultant with the Court Consulting Service. His consulting engagements since joining the Center in 2006 are wide- ranging, including caseflow management, operations, reengineering, facilities planning, efficiency studies, and organizational development. He also works with the Institute for Court Management, the Center’s education arm, to develop and present trial court leadership programs targeting trial court presiding judges, chief administrative officers, middle managers, and program professionals in general, limited and specialized courts. Additionally, Mr. Griller serves as the Executive Director for the National Association of Presiding Judges and Court Executive Officers, a nonprofit educational and research organization focused on state courts.
HON. JENNIFER GREEN serves as Superior Court Judge in Maricopa County, currently assigned to family court. Prior to her appointment in 2014, she worked as an Assistant U.S. Attorney at the United States Attorney’s Office, where she served as Section Chief of Southwest Border Crimes, and prosecuted violent crimes in Indian Country and drug trafficking cases. Judge Green also prosecuted gang and vehicular crimes cases with the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. She began her legal career trying cases at the Gilbert Prosecutor’s Office, after serving as a law clerk to the Honorable Jon W. Thompson of the Arizona Court of Appeals. Judge Green is a former Maricopa County Bar President and is a member of the Maricopa County Justice Museum and Learning Center Foundation Board of Directors.
PAULA L. HANNAFORD-AGOR is the Director of the Center for Juries Studies, joined the Research Division of the National Center in May 1993. In this capacity, she regularly conducts research and provides technical assistance and education to courts and court personnel on the topics of jury system management and trial procedure; civil litigation; and complex and mass tort litigation.Specific research efforts include:Development of the Jury Managers’ Toolbox, an online diagnostic tool to help court administrators, administrative judges, and jury managers evaluate the effectiveness of their jury operations;A national survey of judges, lawyers, and jury managers on existing jury improvement efforts;A national study of civil bench and jury trials in 46 large, urban courts in 2001;A multi-site examination of the frequency and causes of hung juries in felony cases;An analysis of judicial removal of jurors for cause and attorney use of peremptory challenges in the Superior Courts of California;A compilation of innovations in jury management technology; andAn evaluation of the impact of Arizona Civil Rule 39(f) permitting jurors in civil cases to discuss the evidence among themselves. She has authored or contributed to numerous books and articles on the American jury including: Jury Trial Innovations (2d ed. 2006); The Promise and Challenges of Jury System Technology (NCSC 2003); and Managing Notorious Trials (1998). She is faculty for the ICM courses Jury System Management and Promise and Challenges of Jury System Technology. As adjunct faculty at William & Mary Law School, she teaches a seminar on the American jury. Ms. Hannaford-Agor holds a Juris Doctor degree from William and Mary Law School, a M.A. from Thomas Jefferson Program in Public Policy of the College of William and Mary, and a B.A. from George Mason University.
NATHAN HALL is a registered Architect and Senior Consultant for the National Center for State Courts. Since joining the National Center in 2008, he has been involved in over 150 court facility and security projects for state and local courts across the nation. His expertise includes court security assessment, facility planning and design, and court technology planning. Mr. Hall is the staff liaison to the Conference of Chief Justices and Conference of State Court Administrators (CCJ/COSCA) and is the primary editor of the 2016 Steps to Best Practices for Court Building Security published by the NCSC. Mr. Hall provides technical assistance and training for court officials, design professionals, and security professionals and has published multiple articles about courthouse planning and design appearing in Courts Today and in the NCSC Future Trends series.
STEPHANIE HESS is the Deputy Administrative Director of the Supreme Court of Ohio. She is licensed to practice law in the State of Ohio as well as the United States District Court, Southern District of Ohio. Stephanie is a Past President of the National Association for Court Management (NACM), a member of the International Association for Court Administration, the Ohio Association for Court Administration, the American Bar Association, the Ohio State Bar Association, and the Columbus Bar Association. Additionally, she serves as a faculty member for the National Center for State Courts, Institute for Court Management, and is a member of the board for the National Center for State Courts. Prior to joining the Supreme Court of Ohio, Stephanie worked for the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas – General Trial Division for eleven years as a bailiff and then as the Director of Human Resources for the court. She received her Bachelor’s Degree and Juris Doctorate, both from Capital University in Columbus, Ohio.
ROBIN HOSKINS has a variety of experiences working with diverse populations involved in the justice and child welfare systems. She has helped develop programs to meet their unique needs, evaluated programs for effectiveness, and authored grants to fund existing and new programs. She has worked for Child Protective Services, Juvenile Probation, Adult Probation, Family Court Administration, Juvenile Court Administration, and Superior Court Administration. She holds a Masters degree in Professional Counseling with a concentration in art therapy. She also has a Masters degree in Education. She is an Arizona state licensed counselor. Ms. Hoskins is currently a Faculty Associate at ASU in the School of Social Work. Her professional affiliations include being a member of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, the Arizona Association of Drug Court Professionals and the National Association of Social Workers. She currently is a member of the Maricopa County Justice Museum and Learning Center Foundation Board of Directors.
GARY KRCMARIK currently serves as the County Court Administrator for Coconino County, having served in this position for twenty-two years. Prior to joining Coconino County, he worked in the limited and general jurisdiction trial courts of the State of California for over fifteen years. Mr. Krcmarik is a Fellow of the Institute for Court Management. He received a Bachelor’s Degree with High Honors, from California State University, Dominguez Hills, a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the University of Southern California, and a Certificate in Judicial Administration from the University of Southern California.
TARA KUNKEL is presently on detail to the Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance through an interagency agreement serving as a Senior Drug Policy Advisor. In her work at BJA, Ms. Kunkel is responsible for implementing the opioid-related grants distributed through the Department of Justice.. Prior to her detail at BJA, Ms. Kunkel spent five years as a court consultant providing leadership on the implementation of evidence-based practices in the justice system. She also spent fourteen years as a drug court administrator, probation officer and criminal justice planner. Ms. Kunkel graduated from Virginia Commonwealth University with a Masters in Social Work and received her BA in Psychology from the University of Virginia.
GARY MARCHANT, Ph.D., J.D., M.P.P., serves as the Regents’ Professor and Lincoln Professor of Emerging Technologies, Law & Ethics, and Faculty Director of the Center for Law, Science & Innovation, at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, Arizona State University (ASU). He also serves as a Professor at the School of Life Sciences and Distinguished Sustainability Scientist at the Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU. Professor Marchant’s research interests include the governance of emerging technologies, legal aspects of personalized medicine, use of genetic information in the legal system, legal aspects of risk assessment and risk management, and the application of science and technology in the legal system. He teaches courses such as Law, Science & Technology; Genetics and the Law; Biotechnology: Science, Law and Policy; Health Care Technologies; and Big Data, Privacy, and Emerging Technologies. Prior to joining the College faculty in 1999, Professor Marchant was a partner at the Washington, D.C., office of Kirkland & Ellis, where his practice focused on environmental and administrative law. During law school, he was Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Technology and editor of the Harvard Environmental Law Review, and was awarded the Fay Diploma (awarded to top graduating student at Harvard Law School). Professor Marchant frequently lectures about the intersection of law and science at national and international conferences. He has authored more than 120 articles and book chapters on various issues relating to emerging technologies. Among other activities, he has served on five National Research Council committees, has been the principal investigator on several major grants, and has organized dozens of academic conferences and workshops on law and science issues.
MARY C. MCQUEEN has served as president of the National Center for State Courts since August 2004. Previously McQueen served as Washington State court administrator from 1987-2004 and director of Judicial Services for the Washington State Office of the Administrator for the Courts, 1979-1987, president of the Conference of State Court Administrators in 1995-96, and chair of the Lawyer’s Committee of the American Bar Association/Judicial Administration Division. She is a member of the Washington and U.S. Supreme Court Bars. She has received the American Judicature Society’s Herbert Harley Award and the NCSC Innovation in Jury Management Award. Recently, McQueen received the John Marshall Award, presented by the American Bar Association Judicial Division in recognition of her lifetime contributions to the improvement of the administration of justice, judicial independence, justice reform and public awareness. President McQueen serves as Secretary General of the International Organization on Judicial Training (IOJT) consisting of 80 country members. She holds a bachelors of arts degree from the University of Georgia and a juris doctorate from Seattle University Law School.
POLICE CHIEF SYLVIA MOIR leads the police department in Tempe, Arizona. She was appointed Chief in March 2016. A California native, Moir has 29 years of local police experience. She served as Chief of the El Cerrito Police Department from 2010 until her appointment in Tempe. Moir spent most of her early career with the Sacramento Police Department where she served in every division of the department. In the Sacramento Police Department, Chief Moir served as a patrol officer, field training officer, detective, academy commander, watch commander, and other assignments. She was responsible for racial profiling studies, Incident Command Training, daily safety and service in the Downtown Sacramento Area surrounding the State Capitol, and specialized units serving the entire city. She was the Incident Commander on hundreds of planned and spontaneous events utilizing up to 450 police personnel on single incidents in the safe crowd management of nearly 50,000 demonstrators at an event. Chief Moir has been a facilitator and trainer for in-service and basic academy recruits in a variety of operational and administrative disciplines for over two decades. Chief Moir was appointed by California Governor Jerry Brown to the Commission on California Peace Officer Standards and Training for two terms, she served on the Executive Committee for the California Police Chiefs Association, and as the President of the West Contra Costa County Chiefs. She is currently an Executive Fellow for the Police Foundation, on the Community Policing Committee of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, an advisor for the American Law Institute, and on the Law Enforcement Council for the U.S. Humane Society. Chief Moir holds a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice from California State University, Sacramento, a Master of Arts in Organizational Management, and a Master of Science degree from the Naval Postgraduate School- Center for Homeland Defense and Security where she published her thesis titled: FLUID LEADERSHIP: INVITING DIVERSE INPUTS TO ADDRESS COMPLEX PROBLEMS. Chief Moir is a graduate of the Sherman Block Supervisory Leadership Institute (SBSLI) and LAPD West Point Leadership.
HON. ROSA MROZ is a judge with the Superior Court of Arizona, Maricopa County. Judge Mroz is currently assigned the Civil Court Department. Judge Mroz has also served in the Criminal Court Department, Family Court Department and was the Presiding Judge of the Probate and Mental Health Court Department. Judge Mroz was awarded the 2012 Arizona Supreme Court Judicial Achievement Award in the General Jurisdiction Category. Under her leadership, Judge Mroz and the Probate and Mental Health Department were the recipients of the 2013 National Association for Court Management’s Justice Achievement Award, and the 2013 National Association of Counties’ Achievement Award in the category of Court Administration and Management for “Reinventing Probate Court in Maricopa County: Restoring Public Trust and Confidence in the Judiciary.” Before she became a judge, Judge Mroz worked as a civil litigator with the Liability Management Section of the Arizona Attorney General’s Office, and with the firms of Fennemore Craig and Jennings Strouss & Salmon. Judge Mroz has also worked as a prosecutor with the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, mostly in the Sex Crimes Bureau. Judge Mroz was a law clerk for former Arizona Supreme Court Justice James Duke Cameron, and former Arizona Court of Appeals Judge Thomas Kleinschmidt. Prior to becoming a lawyer, she practiced as a Certified Public Accountant with the firm of Price Waterhouse and Motorola, Inc. Judge Mroz received both her undergraduate and law degrees, with honors, from Arizona State University.
HON. KIRK NAKAMURA graduated from Duke University School of Law with a Juris Doctor degree in 1980 and from the University of California, Irvine, with a Bachelor of Science degree in Biological Science in 1977, where he was a Chancellor’s Scholar. Judge Nakamura grew up locally in Orange County and attended Walt Disney Elementary School, Brookhurst Junior High School, and Savanna High School in Anaheim. Before his appointment to the bench, Judge Nakamura practiced civil litigation for 19 years.He was appointed as Planning Commissioner for the City of Yorba Linda. He is past president of the Orange County Japanese American Lawyers Association and the Orange County Asian American Bar Association. He was also a director of the Orange County Bar Association and a member of the Duke Alumni Interview Advisory Committee.Judge Nakamura was appointed to the Orange County Superior Court bench by Governor Gray Davis 2001. In his first assignment, he heard civil and criminal cases at the West Justice Center in Westminster. Since 2004, he has been assigned to the Central Justice Center in Santa Ana and has heard limited and unlimited civil cases.As a judge, he has served as a member of the Superior Court Executive Committee, chair of the Temporary Judge Committee, chair of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Committee, member of the Grand Jury Selection Committee, and member of the Jury Orientation Committee. He was an adjunct professor for Chapman Law School teaching Construction Law in 2004. He received the Outstanding Service Award from the Orange County Asian American Bar Association in 2008, the Constitutional Rights Foundation-Orange County Judge of the Year in 2010, and the Trailblazer Award from National Asian Pacific American Bar Association in 2011. He has presided over numerous mock trials for high school, college, and law students and has supervised more than 20 law school interns at the Court.
HON. NAN G. NASH was appointed to the New Mexico Second Judicial District Court Bench, Division XVII in January 2003. Judge Nash served as presiding judge of the SJDC Family Court from December 2004 through September 2007. She joined the Civil Division in September 2007. Judge Nash was elected as Chief Judge of the SJDC in April 2014 and April 2017.Prior to joining the bench, Judge Nash served as a Special Commissioner of Domestic Violence and a Child Support Hearing Officer for the Second Judicial District Court. She has served on numerous task forces and committees addressing family violence and family law issues including chairing the Supreme Court Domestic Relations Task Force.Judge Nash began her career with the Second Judicial District Court as the director of Court Alternatives. She remains active in the alternative dispute resolution community. She taught ADR related courses as an adjunct professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law since 1994, most recently teaching Family Mediation Training from 1999 through 2015.Judge Nash currently serves as Chair of the Supreme Court Access to Justice Commission and recently completed an eight year term on the New Mexico Judicial Standards Commission. Her work as chief judge has focused on criminal pretrial reform, the elder and disability initiative and the fiscal and administrative management of the court.Judge Nash in a graduate of Indiana University School of Law and practiced with the firm of Civerolo, Gralow & Hill, P.A. before joining the Court.
ANDREA OLSON is the Customer Services Manager for the Wisconsin Court System’s Consolidated Court Automation Programs (CCAP). Andrea has been employed at CCAP since 1993. As the Customer Services Manager, Andrea is responsible for the implementation and support of hardware and software applications for over 2800 court system customers. Andrea is also responsible for the operation of the CCAP Call Center which provides hardware and software support to court users, government agencies and the public.
RONALD G. OVERHOLT held several progressively senior management positions with the Superior Court of California, County of Sand Diego, one of the largest courts in California, from 1979 to 1988. Mr. Overholt held the position of Assistant Executive Officer for the Superior Court of California, County of Alameda form 1988 to 1991 and then progressed to the position of Chief Executive Officer where he served from 1991 to 2000. As chief executive officer, jury commissioner, and clerk of the court working with the Presiding Judge, Mr. Overholt was responsible for managing operation in a court with approximately 400,000 annual filings, 80 judicial officers, and approximately 900 full-time employees. In 1996 he was named California Court Administrator of the Year by the Judicial Council of California, and in 2009 received a Distinguished Service Award from the National Center for State Courts. He was the Chief Deputy Director of the California Administrative Office of the Courts from 2000 to 2012. He is a member of the national Association for Court Management (NACM) as well as the National Association for Presiding Judges and Court Executive Officers (NAPCO) and is past advisory member of the Judicial Council of California, the policy making body for California’s Courts. Mr. Overholt was appointed Administrator of the Superior Court in Pima County in September of 2016, where, since 2012, he served as Deputy Court Administrator. He earned his B.A. in Sociology from San Diego state University and his Masters in Public Administration from National University.
GREG POPOVICH was appointed the Court Administrator for the General Division of the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court in September of 2008. With 34 elected Judges, the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court is the largest General Division Court in Ohio. Greg is responsible for all of the day-to-day non-judicial affairs for the Court and oversees a staff of almost 500 people assigned to thirteen unique departments. He manages the Court’s General Fund budget of about $49 million and an all funds budget of $55 million. Almost 28 years ago Greg began his career with the Court as a Judicial Law Clerk serving two Judges. He later served as the Administrative Law Clerk to three Administrative and Presiding Judges of the Common Pleas Court while concurrently serving as the Court’s Director of Training and Development for a number of years. Greg received his undergraduate degree from Wittenberg University with majors in Economics and Political Science. He received his law degree from the University of Toledo and was admitted to the Ohio Bar in 1989. In 1998 Greg became a Fellow of the National Center for State Courts upon graduating from the Center’s Court Executive Program where he received the equivalent of a Master’s Degree in Court Administration. Greg has trained and spoken on a number of topics throughout Ohio for the Ohio Supreme Court and other legal and community organizations. He has been appointed to and served on a number of local and Supreme Court committees. Greg is a former President for the Ohio Association for Court Administration and remains a contributing member of the Association.
BETH S. RIGGERT has served as communications counsel for the Supreme Court of Missouri since 2001. An attorney with more than 20 years of experience in communications, Beth has directed the Missouri judiciary’s strategic communications – including media relations and website management – since 2001 and has been heavily involved in the courts’ civic education efforts since 2011. For more than five years, Beth served on the adjunct faculty of Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri, where she taught journalism, law and public relations. She now teaches media relations, social media and crisis communications for judges, clerks and other court personnel and has spoken to state and national audiences about media relations, strategic communications and court-community collaboration. She also is a trustee of the Supreme Court of Missouri Historical Society. Beth earned her law degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia and her bachelor’s degree in mass communications-public relations, with honors, from Stephens College. Before joining the Court, she worked eight years for the Missouri attorney general. Beth is serving a two-year term as president of the international Conference of Court Public Information Officers and is helping to staff a national grant-funded project to update “Managing Notorious Trials” for the 21st century.
HON. JOHN J. RUSSO, Immediate Past President, NAPCO, is the Administrative and Presiding Judge of the Court of Common Pleas of Ohio in Cuyahoga County serving the Greater Cleveland metropolitan region. He was elected by the NAPCO Board of Directors as President of the Association in July 2015 at the Annual Meeting in Louisville, KY. He will be serving a two-year term as the first NAPCO President until the Annual Meeting in 2017. Cuyahoga County is the most populous of Ohio’s eighty-eight counties. It is home to 1.2 million people (2010 census). Judge Russo was elected unanimously by his colleagues in November 2013 to lead the Court. He is responsible for appointing committees, coordinating the development of Court policies, and overseeing the administration and dockets of the General Division, the highest trial court in the state. He has chaired or participated in numerous justice system boards and committees since beginning his judicial career on the Common Pleas Court, including Chair, Lawyers Fund for Client Protection (appointed by the Ohio Supreme Court); Co-Chairman, Ohio Judicial Conference Court Administration Committee; Trustee, Cleveland Marshall Law Alumni Association; Chairperson, Cuyahoga County Security Committee; Trustee, Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association; Trustee, Westshore Bar Association; and Past President, Legal Eagles St. Edward High School Community. Judge Russo has taught at numerous court conclaves, judges’ conferences, community programs and bar association meetings, including the Ohio Supreme Court Judicial College; the Ohio Common Pleas Judges Association; the Ohio Association for Justice; the National Business Institute; Ohio Association of Civil Trial Attorney; the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association, the National Center for State Courts workshop on trial court governance and leadership, and the Cleveland Marshall Alumni Association. He is a member of the Ohio State Bar Association, Cuyahoga Metropolitan Bar Association, Westshore Bar Association and Cleveland Marshall Law Alumni Association. Judge Russo has been active with the Judicial Legislative Exchange Program, Lawyer-to-Lawyer Mentoring Program and the 3R’s Program with the Cleveland Municipal School District. He also volunteers as a judge in the Ohio Mock Trial State & Local Competitions. Judge Russo is a member of the American Inns of Court, Trustee of the Justinian Forum and the Italians Sons and Daughters of America (I.S.D.A.). He is active in the Mock Trial Program at St. Edward High School, teaching Street Law class at that high school and active with Senior Career Day. Judge Russo has also received the honor of being named “The Legal Eagle Man of The Year.” He has participated as a volunteer Coach at St. Bernadette School and is also active in the St. Bernadette Parish. As a member of the bench, Judge Russo has been a guest speaker and host for various students of all grades when they come to Court and experience “a day in the life of a Judge.” Prior to assuming the bench, Judge Russo practiced as a civil and criminal litigator for 12 years in his own law firm. He earned a B.S.B.A. degree at John Carroll University and his J.D. degree at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law.
RICHARD SANKOVITZ has over 19 years of judicial administration experience working at general and limited jurisdiction courts, and at the Michigan State Court Administrative Office (SCAO). Since 2012, he has served as one of the Deputy Court Administrators at the Maricopa County Superior Court where his assignments have included executive oversight of the Criminal Department, Civil / Tax / Lower Court of Appeals Department, Family Department, Juvenile Department, Probate and Mental Health Department, the Research, Planning and Statistics Department, ADR Unit, Judge Pro Tem Coordination, Grants Management, and Problem Solving Courts. From 2008 to 2012, as Deputy Director for the Trial Court Services Division of the Michigan SCAO, Richard was tasked with statewide administrative oversight of all problem-solving courts. This included management of several state grant programs, providing technical assistance with the design, planning and implementation of specialty courts, administering operational reviews, assisting with the review and drafting of new legislation that governs the operation of problem-solving courts, facilitating statewide trainings, and strategic planning to endorse the therapeutic jurisprudence model. Prior to his court management experience, he worked as a mental health and substance abuse therapist. Richard earned his B.A.A. degree from Central Michigan University, M.A. degree from the University of Arizona, and M.P.A. degree from Western Michigan University.
HON. DUANE SLONE is a former drug trafficking prosecutor, was first elected to the 4th Judicial District Circuit Court in 1998. In 2009 Judge Slone co-founded his judicial district’s Drug Recovery Court that currently has a Veterans Treatment Court track. Presently, Judge Slone serves as the Chairman of the Tennessee Judicial Opioid Initiative, Chairman of the 7 State Regional Judicial Opioid Initiative, and Chairman of the Tennessee Judicial Conference Problem Solving Committee. In 2015 the Tennessee Public Health Association awarded Judge Slone with its only state-wide award given to someone outside of the health field, the annual “Partners and Leadership Award.” This award was the result of his leadership in addressing drug addiction & neonatal abstinence syndrome. In 2016 Judge Slone was given the Tennessee Public Health Association’s “Visionary Award”, the Tennessee Association of Alcohol, Drug and other Addiction Services “ Voice of Recovery Award” and “Jefferson Countian of the Year” award. Judge Slone is a co-founder of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Dumplin Valley and serves as Honduras Ministries Coordinator at True Life Church in Jefferson City, Tennessee.
HON. ROXANNE SONG ONG was appointed the Chief Presiding Judge of the Phoenix Municipal Court in 2005 and served in that position until her retirement in 2014. She is recognized as the first Asian woman lawyer and judge in the State of Arizona and is the first woman and minority to be named as the City’s Chief Judge. She has served as a judge for Phoenix since 1991 and was appointed the Assistant Presiding Judge in 2000. Prior to that, she served as a judge for the Scottsdale City Court from 1986-1991. Prior to judging, Judge Song Ong practiced in the areas of criminal prosecution, defense, and immigration law. Offices Held: 2014 President of the National Conference of Metropolitan Courts (NCMC); Chair of the Arizona Supreme Court’s Commission on Minorities (COM); Chair of the Arizona Supreme Court Committee on Judicial Education and Training (COJET); Member Arizona Judicial Council (AJC); Member Supreme Court Commission on Technology (COT); 2012 President of the Arizona Foundation for Legal Services and Education; Board Member and faculty for the State Bar of Arizona’s Leadership Institute; Faculty for the Arizona Supreme Court’s New Judge Orientation Program and the Arizona Judicial College. Honors and Awards: 2016 UA Law College Public Service Award; 2014 YWCA Tribute to Leadership Award for Public Service; 2013 Maricopa County Bar Association’s Hall of Fame Inductee; 2013 Arizona Supreme Court Judge of the Year; 2013 Asian Pacific Community in Action Award; One of “48 Most Intriguing Women in Arizona 2012” by the Arizona Historical Society; 2010 recipient of the Arizona State Bar’s Judicial Award of Excellence; 2009 National Asian American Bar Association’s Trailblazer Award; One of “100 Outstanding Women and Minorities for the State of Arizona 2000” by the State and County Bar Associations; and, the 1999 Arizona Bar Foundation’s Attorney Law-Related Education Award.
HON. JEFFREY THOMPSON is the District Judge in Winona, Minnesota looking forward to retirement sometime next spring. I am 68 years old. I was educated at St. Paul Academy, Carleton College and William Mitchell College of Law. I spent 7 years in private practice in Winona and 6 years as an Assistant Winona County Attorney. I then served 10 years as Rice County Attorney, and now 18 years as a District Judge. After serving four years as Assistant Chief Judge, I was elected to serve two terms as Chief Judge of Minnesota’s Third Judicial District starting April 1, 2013 and ending June 30, 2017. Diane and I have five children and seven grandchildren. I enjoy tai chi, chess, and walking my dog. My interests include history, government, and trial skills. I invite questions and contact. Patricia Tobias, has been with the NCSC’s Court Consulting Services division as a Principal Court Management Consultant since August 2014. Ms. Tobias has experience working in a wide variety of national, statewide, and local projects including those involving leadership and governance, organizational assessment, caseflow management, and criminal justice reform. She also serves as Educational Consultant to the National Association of Court Managers (NACM), and often presents at state and national conferences. Prior to becoming a Principal Court Management Consultant, Ms. Tobias served as the Administrative Director of the Idaho Courts for 20+ years, since November 1993. She previously served as the Clerk of the Court, St. Louis County, Missouri (1986-1993); Director of Court Services Division, Office of the State Courts Administrator, Missouri Supreme Court (1980-1986); and Adult and Juvenile Probation Services, Champaign County Circuit Court, Illinois (1976-1979). Ms. Tobias served as President of the Conference of State Court Administrators and as Vice-Chair of the NCSC’s Board of Directors (2002-2003) and on the Council of State Governments’ Justice Center Board of Directors (2009-2011). She received the NCSC’s Warren E. Burger Award for Administrative Excellence, 2012; the Robert L. Doss, Jr., Memorial Scholarship, 2011; the Justice Management Institute’s Ernest C. Friesen Award of Excellence, 2008; the Idaho State Bar’s Award of Distinction, 2003; the Public Policy Leadership Award, 2003; and the Kramer Award for Excellence in Judicial Administration, 2001. Ms. Tobias received her M.S.J.A. from the University of Denver College of Law and her B.S. from the University of Illinois.
HON. RANDALL H. WARNER has been a judge of the Superior Court of Arizona since October 1, 2007. He is currently the Civil Presiding Judge in Maricopa County and has a complex civil calendar, having previously served on family court and criminal court assignments. Before that, Judge Warner was a partner at Jones, Skelton & Hochuli, LLC where he had an appellate and commercial litigation practice. Judge Warner has served on a number of State Bar and Supreme Court committees. He teaches and writes frequently on civil practice issues, legal writing and effective advocacy.
BOB WESSELS served the Harris County Courts system for 37 years, 35 as Court Manager (1974 – 2011). During his career at Harris County he implemented performance based case management systems, introduced measures to identify and prioritize the disposition of cases in which the defendant was incarcerated and/or had mental health issues. He was part of a team responsible for implementation of orders in Alberti vs the Sheriff and the development and implementation of one of the early “integrated justice systems” in the country. Currently Mr. Wessels serves as Vice Chair – Judicial Committee on Information Technology, on the Boards of SEARCH – The National Consortium for Criminal Justice Information and Statistic, the Justice Management Institute and the National Association of Presiding Judges and Court Executive Officers. He is the Program Coordinator for “The Executive Forum for Criminal Justice Planners”, Corrections Management Institute, Criminal Justice Center, Sam Houston State University. He has taught court management, judicial administration, and management information systems as an adjunct professor at the University of Houston, Clear Lake, Sam Houston State University, the Institute for Court Management and for the Texas Center for the Judiciary. He is a founding member of the Texas Association for Court Administration (TACA), the National Association for Court Management (NACM) and The Urban Court Managers Network. He is Past President of the National Association for Court Management. He served on the boards of directors of the National Center for State Courts (1996–2002) the Justice Management Institute (1994–2002). Mr. Wessels was the first recipient of the Justice Charles W. Barrow Award. In 1996 the Bob Wessels Scholarship was created by the Texas Association for Court Administration. In 2003 he received the Distinguished Service Award from the National Center for State Courts, the Award of Merit from the National Association for Court Management in 2005, and the Chair’s Award of Excellence from the Judicial Section, State Bar of Texas, in 2007. He is the 2011 recipient of the Justice Management Institute’s “Ernest C. Friesen” Award, and the “Warren E. Burger Award for Excellence In Court Administration”, National Center for State Courts. In 2013 he received the “Gary R. Cooper Meritorious Service Award” – SEARCH, The National Consortium for Justice Information and Statistics. He is the 2014 recipient of the “Robert O. Dawson” Award, presented by the Texas Indigent Defense Commission. He received his BBA from Sam Houston State University and an MA from the University of Houston, Clear Lake, and is a Fellow of the Institute for Court Management.
HON. MAXINE ALDRIDGE WHITE was appointed by the Wisconsin Supreme Court as Chief Judge – the chief administrator and spokesperson for Wisconsin’s First Judicial District, which is comprised of all of Milwaukee County, in March 2015. As the chief judge, she is responsible for the administration of the business of all the 47 state trial courts with general jurisdiction and the 19 municipal courts within the judicial administrative district. Her responsibilities include supervising personnel, budget, defining court operations, enforcing policies, issuing directives and fiscal management. As one of Wisconsin’s 10 chief judges, she meets monthly to work with the Supreme Court on issues of statewide importance. Over the years, Chief Judge White has chaired statewide commissions and provided leadership on a number of challenging subjects of statewide importance, including, racial profiling, racial disparity in sentencing, gender equality, and judicial selection in Wisconsin, at the request of the Supreme Court, the Wisconsin Governor, the State Legislature or a combination of same. In August 2015, she was elected unanimously by the Milwaukee Community Justice Council’s Executive Committee to serve as its Chair. The Milwaukee Community (not Criminal) Justice Council (MCJC) was created by Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors’ Resolution in 2007 and is made up of Milwaukee-area criminal justice agencies and local governments working collaboratively to ensure a fair, efficient, and effective justice system that enhances public safety and quality of life in our community. The Council is governed by an Executive Committee made up representatives of each participating organization. The purpose of the Council is to function as an independent entity governed by key justice system leaders that is empowered to define broad justice system goals, monitor/analyze justice system performance, facilitate collaboration among justice system partners, provide technical assistance and research, and act as a conduit between the justice system and the larger community without impacting in any way the autonomy or decision-making authority of any criminal justice system agency. One of our Council’s most recent accomplishments was announced in April 2015, when Milwaukee’s Council was selected as one of 11 out of over 200 applicant jurisdictions in the nation to win a $2 million grant to be used for the purpose of reducing reliance on the use of jails and reducing racial disparity in the jail population. Some of the Council’s winning strategies are aimed at the diversion of the mentally ill from jail to treatment and sustainable housing, providing trauma informed training to hundreds of employees and justice system contractors working within the justice system, increasing the capacity to capture data, analyze it and make evidence based decisions on our process and outcomes, to name a few. Before being named chief, for over 23 years, she presided as a trial judge over specialty or dedicated courts: homicide/ sexual assault/ and sexual predator court; domestic violence court and a court dedicated to the prosecutions for the sale and distribution of drugs/controlled substances. For 8 years she presided over Civil Court hearing cases involving medical malpractice, administrative agency review, personal injury, contract, insurance and governmental and constitutional dispute. As a Family court judge she served as presiding judge over the Division and tried cases. Immediately upon graduating from law school, she served for a period of 7 year as an Assistant United States Attorney, Eastern District of Wisconsin, prosecuting and defending cases in the federal trial courts in Milwaukee and the federal appeals court in Chicago. She has a B.A. magna cum laude, from Alcorn State University; a Masters Degree, with honors, in Public Administration, from the University of Southern California; and her Juris Doctorate, Marquette University Law School, with membership on the Law Review, including the Am. Jur. Book Award in Constitutional Law and numerous merit scholarships.
MICHAEL D. WHITE, Ph.D., is a Professor in the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Arizona State University, and is Associate Director of ASU’s Center for Violence Prevention and Community Safety. He is also Director of the Doctoral Program in Criminology and Criminal Justice at ASU. Dr. White is a Senior Subject Matter Expert for the Bureau of Justice Assistance’s Smart Policing Initiative, and he is Co-Director of Training and Technical Assistance for the US Department of Justice Body-Worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program. He received his Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from Temple University in 1999. Prior to entering academia, Dr. White worked as a deputy sheriff in Pennsylvania. Dr. White’s primary research interests involve the police, including use of force, technology, and misconduct. His recent work has been published in Justice Quarterly, Criminology and Public Policy, Criminal Justice and Behavior and Applied Cognitive Psychology. He is co-author of Stop and Frisk: The Use and Abuse of a Controversial Policing Tactic (2016); and Jammed Up: Bad Cops, Police Misconduct, and the New York City Police Department (2013; both published by New York University Press). Dr. White has commented extensively in the media on police issues, especially body-worn cameras, including in Scientific American, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, TIME Magazine, NPR, and MSNBC. He also testified about body-worn cameras before the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing. Dr. White is currently conducting a multi-site randomized controlled trial testing the impact of police officer body-worn cameras in Tempe, Arizona and Spokane, Washington (funded by the Laura and John Arnold Foundation).
MICHELLE WHITE, began her work for the NCSC in 2012 as a Principal Court Management Consultant with expertise in problem-solving courts and community supervision. Since that time, she has worked with state and local courts in Colorado, Michigan, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, West Virginia, Virginia, and others as an evaluator and in the development of performance measures. She also acts as the Executive Director for the Regional Judicial Opioid Initiative, a seven state judicially led initiative that leverages local, state, and federal partnerships and resources to explore solutions to the opioid epidemic. Ms. White has over 15 years of experience working with courts and multidisciplinary teams. She was the Drug Court Program Manager for the Loudoun County, Virginia, Treatment Court from its inception in 2004. Prior to that, she was a Criminal Justice Planner in Loudoun County. She helped to develop the Drug Court Management Information System that is used by all juvenile, family, and adult drug court programs across Virginia. Ms. White also has experience as a state probation and parole officer and as a police officer. From 2009-2011, Ms. White served as President of the Virginia Drug Court Association, and as a member of the Statewide Drug Court Advisory Committee. In May 2011, the Governor of Virginia appointed her to serve on the Governor’s Substance Abuse Services Council. She graduated from George Mason University with both a master’s in public administration and a bachelor’s in administration of justice.
HON. JONATHAN S. WILLIAMS was appointed as the second Court Administrator of the Massachusetts Trial Court by the Supreme Judicial Court effective May 2017. He partners with the Chief Justice of the Trial Court in the oversight of 6,300 court staff and 100 court facilities. He served four years as Senior Deputy Director in the North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts, where he supervised operations for the Judicial Branch, including technology, finance and general services. He served as the Chief Reporter to the Commission on the Administration of Law and Justice, a 65-member multidisciplinary group tasked to make broad recommendations for court reform in North Carolina which delivered its final report in March 2017. He previously served as Assistant Secretary for the North Carolina Department of Commerce and Chairman of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission. He spent ten years at the North Carolina Department of Crime Control and Public Safety, including service as Deputy Secretary, as General Counsel, and as a member of the Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. He also spent eight years as a civil litigator in private practice. He received a bachelor’s degree in political science and philosophy and a law degree from the University of North Carolina. Jonathan S. Williams was appointed as the second Court Administrator of the Massachusetts Trial Court by the Supreme Judicial Court effective May 2017. He partners with the Chief Justice of the Trial Court in the oversight of 6,300 court staff and 100 court facilities. He served four years as Senior Deputy Director in the North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts, where he supervised operations for the Judicial Branch, including technology, finance and general services. He served as the Chief Reporter to the Commission on the Administration of Law and Justice, a 65-member multidisciplinary group tasked to make broad recommendations for court reform in North Carolina which delivered its final report in March 2017. He previously served as Assistant Secretary for the North Carolina Department of Commerce and Chairman of the Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission. He spent ten years at the North Carolina Department of Crime Control and Public Safety, including service as Deputy Secretary, as General Counsel, and as a member of the Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. He also spent eight years as a civil litigator in private practice. He received a bachelor’s degree in political science and philosophy and a law degree from the University of North Carolina.