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Six Legal Community Luminaries Named ‘Persons of Year’

To Be Honored Are Former District Court Judge/Ex-DEA Chief Robert C. Bonner, Superior Court Judge Linda Sun, Superior Court Commissioner Karin Borzakian, and retired Judge Isabel Cohen, Lawyers Paul and Joshua Cohen

By a MetNews Staff Writer

ROBERT BONNER

mediator

KARIN BORZAKIAN

commissioner

ISABEL COHEN

retired judge

JOSHUA COHEN

attorney

PAUL F. COHEN

attorney

LINDA SUN

judge

Six persons—including two sitting Los Angeles Superior Court bench officers, two retired jurists, and two practicing lawyers—have been designated by the Metropolitan News-Enterprise as 2025 “persons of the year” in the legal community and each will be profiled in a special supplement and feted at a black-tie dinner.

That dinner will be held on Jan. 23 at the Atheneum in Pasadena.

Honorees are retired U.S. District Court Judge Robert C. Bonner, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Linda L. Sun, Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Karin Borzakian, and the Cohen Family: retired Los Angeles Superior Court Isabel Cohen, her husband, veteran practitioner Paul F. Cohen, and their son, Joshua Cohen, who is Paul Cohen’s law partner.

Bonner’s Background

MetNews Co-Publisher Jo-Ann W. Grace yesterday heralded Bonner as “a former government official whose resume is dazzling, whose achievements are extraordinary.” She said that Bonner shone as U.S. attorney for the Central District of California prior to his ascendency to the bench and in each of his subsequent roles.

He resigned from the judgeship to become administrator of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, serving under Presidents H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, then headed the U.S. Customs Service, later U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In California, Bonner has chaired the Commission on Judicial Performance and the Los Angeles County Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission, as well as participating on various other boards and commissions.

Now an arbitrator/mediator, Bonner previously served two stints as a partner in Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.

Born Abroad

Grace noted that Sun and Borzakian were each born outside the U.S., that English was not the first language of either, and both surmounted challenges in rising to her judicial post.

Their stories are “inspiring,” Grace said, and their performances as bench officers have been lauded.

Sun was born in Hong Kong and her parents, of modest means, strained to provide finances for her to come to the U.S. at age 18. She studied at UCLA, became a special assistant to Secretary of State March Fong Eu (now deceased), and then, as a student at Southwestern Law School, worked as an extern to U.S. District Court Judge Ronald S.W. Lew of the Central District of California (a former “person of the year,” now deceased).

After admission to the State Bar, she joined the Office of California Attorney General, and was serving as a supervising attorney at the time of her election to the Superior Court in 2020.

Fled Iran

Borzakian was age 7, living in Iran’s City of Tehran where she was born, when the revolution broke out. Amid danger and tumult, she fled with her mother to the United States—with her father left behind—departing in the last flight out for many months.

In 2014, she reflected:

“During the years after my immigration to the United States, I faced the challenges of learning English while simultaneously attempting to assimilate into a different culture while attending school. I struggled in my attempt to assimilate at school, while at home my parents cultural outlook conflicted with my efforts. It is from these struggles that I learned to respect different opinions and views.”

Borzakian became a student at a community college, working at a local law firm to earn her tuition and support herself. Transferring to UCLA, she worked at various jobs.

Following graduation, she became a law student at Pepperdine, undertaking a summer internship at the Justice Department.

After law school and passing the bar exam, she served as a Los Angeles Superior Court law clerk in the Civil Division, then, for six years, as research attorney for the supervising judge of the Criminal Division. Borzakian was a deputy district attorney from 2008 until she was sworn in as a Los Angeles Superior Court commissioner in 2016.

Three Cohens

Paul and Isabel Cohen were classmates at the New York University School of Law. But that’s not where they met.

They met at a bar in Harlem in 1958.

Paul Cohen was and is a jazz musician—a drummer—and he nearly turned to a career in music. He did become a lawyer but, even after he and the then-Isabel Raskin were wed and came to California in 1969, and he established a private law practice here in 1972, he maintained a night job as a drummer.

And he still “does gigs” as a drummer, and recently released an album as a vocalist.

That’s a sideline. He’s an accomplished lawyer in the areas of probate and business litigation.

Isabel Cohen was president of California Women Lawyers when appointed to the Los Angeles Municipal Court in 1979 by then-Gov. Jerry Brown. She served as supervising judge of the Van Nuys branch only three years later, and, after becoming a Los Angeles Superior Court judge, gained a high reputation in handling family law cases.

She retired from the Superior Court in 2000 and, for several years, was a mediator/arbitrator.

Son Joshua Cohen, a partner with his father, has carved out a unique niche as a “bicycle-accident” attorney, establishing himself as the “go-to” person by the victim in such a mishap.

Change of Venue

The annual dinners have been held since 1989, except for two years because of the pandemic. The California Club had been the site since 2013—but won’t be in January.

Grace commented:

“That once illustrious institution has been determined to be an unsuitable venue in light of major foul-ups at our dinner last Jan. 31 and the management’s failure to provide assurances that it won’t again disappoint our expectations.”

In particular, she noted, the sound system in January was inadequate, resulting in most of those attending being unable to make out what the speakers were saying.

Too, Grace said, in 2024, vehicles of some of those attending the dinner were diverted to the Central Library parking lot, “creating at the least inconvenience but also potential peril in light of the nature of persons inhabiting that downtown area at night.” A pledge was made by the club that all vehicles of Person of the Year Dinner attendees at the January 2025 event would have valet parking available and, Grace noted:

“That promise was not kept.”

She related that the Atheneum has represented that valet parking will be provided to all who desire it.

Emceeing the 36th dinner will be attorney Brent Braun, a past honoree. Each awardee will be introduced by a past person of the year.