Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Page 3
Assistant P.D. Winston Peters to Receive ABA Juvenile Justice Award
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The American Bar Association yesterday announced that it has selected Los Angeles Assistant Public Defender Winston A. Peters as the recipient of the Livingston Hall Juvenile Justice Award, which will be presented July 31 during the ABA’s annual conference in Chicago.
The award commemorates Livingston Hall, a professor emeritus at Harvard Law School, and is given in recognition of outstanding commitment and service in the field of juvenile justice and advocacy on behalf of children impacted by the juvenile justice system, ABA officials said.
As assistant public defender, Peters oversees the executive and administrative duties for the public defender and chief deputy public defender, including providing oversight of the fiscal budget, human resources and management information systems. He also manages the Special Operations Bureau’s Juvenile Division, which includes the juvenile mental health and drug courts, restorative and collaborative justice programs, adult drug courts/Prop 36 courts, re-entry programs, initiatives and grants.
Peters is also a member of the California State Advisory Committee on Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, the Advisory Board of the UC Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law’s Juvenile Justice Policymaker Education Project, and the MacArthur Foundation’s Juvenile Indigent Defense Action Network.
He was recently elected assistant secretary-treasurer of the California Public Defenders Association, where he also serves as the chairperson of its Juvenile Justice Subcommittee.
A graduate of UC Hastings Law School, Peters received his bachelor’s degree in history from UCLA and was admitted to practice in 1985.
In other news, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Michael Nash has been elected treasurer of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.
Founded in 1937, the Reno, Nev.-based organization bills itself as the nation’s oldest judicial membership organization focused on improving the effectiveness of the nation’s juvenile and family courts.
Nash is past president and a member of the Executive Committee of the Juvenile Court Judges of California, and is a member of the California Child Welfare Council, the California Judicial Council Family and Juvenile Advisory Committee, and the Blue Ribbon Commission on Children in Foster Care.
His many awards include being named Juvenile Court Judge of the Year by the Juvenile Court Judges of California in 1997; Judge of the Year by the National CASA Association in 2006; the Stanley Mosk Legacy of Justice Award by the San Fernando Valley Bar Association in 2007; and the Extraordinary Service to Children Award by the Children’s Institute in 2008.
First appointed to the municipal court bench in 1985, Nash was elevated to the superior court in 1989. He has been a juvenile court judge since 1990 and currently serves as the presiding judge of the Los Angeles Juvenile Court.
A graduate of UCLA and Loyola Law School, Nash was admitted to practice in 1974. He spent nearly a decade as a deputy attorney general and was a co-prosecutor in the Hillside Strangler trial before being tapped for judicial office.
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