Ninth Circuit Senior Judge Sandra S. Ikuta Dies

Friday, December 12, 2025

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Ninth Circuit Senior Judge Sandra S. Ikuta Dies

By a MetNews Staff Writer

SANDRA S. IKUTA

1954-2025

Sandra Ikuta, who was appointed to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2006, has died, one month after assuming senior status.

The court did not make an announcement of her death. However, a memorandum opinion in an immigration case, filed yesterday, says in a footnote:

“Judge Sandra Ikuta, who was a member of the panel at the time the case was argued, passed away on December 7, 2025. In accordance with General Order 3.2(h), this opinion (or memoranda) is issued by the remaining panel members as a quorum pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 46(d).”

Ikuta was nominated by President George W. Bush on Feb, 8, 2006, and was confirmed by the Senate on June 19, 2006, by an 81–0 vote, taking office four days later. It was announced last March 17 that she would assume senior status upon confirmation of her successor, and did on Nov. 7, the same day Eric C. Tung, approved by the Senate two days earlier, took office.

Born in Los Angeles on June 24, 1954, Ikuta earned her law degree from UCLA in 1988. She was a member of the Order of the Coif.

She clerked for then-Ninth Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski from 1988-89 and for then-U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor from 1989-90. Ikuta joined the law firm O’Melveny & Myers as an associate and then became a partner.

The jurist was a member of The Federalist Society, a libertarian group.

Kozinski said yesterday:

“Judge Ikuta was an intelligent, graceful and warm person with dry sense of humor. She was supremely dedicated to her calling as a jurist and to the rule of law. She was beloved by her family and friends, and universally respected for the craft she bought to bear on her opinions. She was a quiet person who spoke only when she had something useful to say, and when she did, people listened.

“I was fortunate to have her as a colleague and, before that, as a law clerk. At the end of her clerkship, I performed the wedding ceremony when she married Ed Ikuta in the Ninth Circuit Pasadena courthouse. My wife baked the cake. Her co-clerk, David Schwarz, performing as Elvis, sang the Hawaiian Wedding Song. Hawaii was one of Sandra’s favorite places.

“Her death is a grave loss to her friends, the legal profession and to America.”