Metropolitan News-Enterprise

 

Monday, June 13, 2005

 

Page 1

 

Judge Gregory C. O達rien to Retire From Local Bench After 20 Years

 

By a MetNews Staff Writer

 

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Gregory C. O達rien Jr. will retire this summer, capping a 20-year judicial career, the MetNews has learned.

O達rien痴 last day of service at the Stanley Mosk courthouse will be June 23, the day after his 60th birthday, and his official retirement date will be Aug. 7.

O達rien was president of the California Judges Association in 2002-2003. Before that he served on the CJA board and on the group痴 Public Information & Education Committee and Discipline Committee.

He also chaired the committee that puts out a number of publications for the group, including their newsletter, The California Bench.

A 1968 graduate of the USC School of Journalism and 1972 Whittier Law School alumnus, O達rien began his law career as a deputy city attorney for Los Angeles, where he worked on criminal and land use cases until 1978.

He had previously worked for the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and as a press aid to Congressman Charles Wiggins, a Republican who later became a Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judge.

He was an attorney for Southern California Edison until he was appointed to the Citrus Municipal Court in 1985 by then-Gov. George Deukmejian, who elevated him to the Superior Court in 1987.

A member of the county Republican Central Committee for seven years before becoming a judge, O達rien took an unpaid leave of absence in 1990 to run for an open seat on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

He qualified for the general election, but returned to the bench after then-U.S. District Judge David Kenyon ruled that the district lines had been drawn in violation of the Voting Rights Act and cancelled the election.

That ruling resulted in the election of Gloria Molina as the first Hispanic supervisor in modern times.

O達rien also wrote a novel, Lenin Lives, published in 1984.

 

Copyright 2005, Metropolitan News Company