Andrew Valdez

Last updated

Andrew A. Valdez (born October 17, 1951) is a Utah Third District Juvenile Court judge for Salt Lake County, Utah. [1]

Contents

Valdez was born in Northern New Mexico and then migrated to Utah where he was educated in the Utah public school system before attending the University of Utah and later the S.J. Quinney College of Law. After being admitted to the Utah bar, Valdez was a public defender for two years before becoming a part of the Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAG corps) where Valdez spent three and a half years in Central Europe. When Valdez returned home from the JAG Corps he once again resumed his position as trial counsel with the Legal Defenders Association Felony and Homicide Division. Valdez spent 9 years working as a public defender and in 1993 he was appointed a Third District Juvenile Court Judge by then Governor Michael O. Leavitt.

Early life

Valdez was born in Northern New Mexico to Victor Valdez and Jeanie Sanchez. Valdez and his 3 siblings migrated to Utah in 1954 where his parents were determined to find financially stable work. [2] As a boy Valdez worked as a shoe-shiner and eventually began selling papers when he was eight years old on the corner of Main Street and 200 South in Salt Lake City, Utah. As a boy Valdez knew he wanted to be a lawyer, while selling papers he was always impressed by lawyer's demeanor and their dress attire. When Andrew Valdez was 10 years old he met a man named Jack Keller who subsequently changed Valdez and his life's direction. Keller brought a whole new world to Andrew's eyes taking him to the Law School at the University of Utah, liberty park and introducing Valdez to tennis which became ultimately part of his lifelong goal and passion. [3] [4]

Valdez attended West High School in Salt Lake City, Utah where he continued to play tennis and graduated with his diploma in 1970. Directly after attending West High, Valdez enrolled in the University of Utah majoring in Political Science and Philosophy. Valdez walked on to the tennis team and competed, however, he put more effort into being a part of student politics at school by involving himself with the war movement, U of U assembly, Chicano student assembly and being a member of the Hinckley Institute of Politics. [2]

After graduating law school, Valdez began his professional career as a public defender with the Legal Defenders Association Felony and Homicide Division. He spent two years working in Utah before he joined JAG Corps and worked as a lawyer in the military for three and a half years. During his time in the JAG Corps Valdez was on the military tennis team and competed against other players within Central Europe. After serving time in the JAG Corps Valdez returned home to Utah and resumed working as a public defender. [5]

In 1993 after spending 9 years working in felony and homicide cases, Valdez was appointed to Utah Third District Juvenile Court. Valdez was the first Hispanic and first public defender to be appointed to the Utah district court. [2] Since being appointed Valdez has served as chair of the statewide Youth Parole Authority, and on the Utah Sentencing Commission, the Board of Trustees for Primary Children’s Medical Center, the Juvenile Justice Task Force, the Board of Juvenile Court Judges, the Judicial Council, and is currently a member of the National Youth Gang Center. [5] [6]

Valdez was certified by the Utah Judicial Council as qualified to stand for judicial retention election in 2008 and was subsequently re-elected. [7]

Judge Valdez has also developed a tennis based mentoring program [8] that goes on at Liberty Park in Salt Lake City, Utah where troubled youth take part in learning the game of tennis. In this program Valdez has hopes of helping kids stay off of the streets and out of gangs by introducing the sport of tennis.

Awards

Judge Valdez was honored in 2003 with the Martin Luther King Civil Rights Award by the NAACP. In 2005, the Footprinter’s Association Law Enforcement Office of the Year Award, the Utah Children Advocate of the Year Award and the Utah State Bar Judge of the Year Award. Valdez was also awarded the Caesar Chavez Peace and Justice Award and the Pete Suazo Community Service Award. [5] [6]

Personal life

Valdez is married to Joyce P. Valdez who is a part of the Board of Trustees at the University of Utah and together they have four kids.

Valdez has written a book named No One Makes it Alone, [9] which is an autobiography of him and his relationship with his mentor Jack Keller and how Keller gave Valdez a job and the ambition to become a lawyer and ultimately a judge.

See also

Related Research Articles

Michael Roland Murphy is a Senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul G. Cassell</span> American judge (born 1959)

Paul George Cassell is a former United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Utah, who is currently the Ronald N. Boyce Presidential Professor of Criminal Law and University Distinguished Professor of Law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah. He is best known as an expert in, and proponent of, victims' rights.

David Kent Winder was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Utah.

Robert K. Hilder was a Third Judicial District Court Judge in Utah. The Third District consists of Salt Lake, Summit, and Tooele counties. He was elected Summit County attorney and was sworn in on January 5, 2015. Prior to that he did extensive mediation and arbitration work.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Curtis Allgier</span> American murderer and white supremacist

Curtis Michael Allgier is an American white supremacist skinhead who is being held in the Utah State Prison in Draper, Utah, for the murder of corrections officer Stephen Anderson.

Ronald E. Nehring was a justice of the Utah Supreme Court. He was appointed to the court in 2003 by Utah Governor Michael Leavitt, and he retired in 2015.

Gregory Keith Orme is one of the seven judges serving on the Utah Court of Appeals.

Michele Mladejovsky Christiansen Forster is an American lawyer who has served as a judge of the Utah Court of Appeals.

Randall Norman Skanchy is a Utah Third Judicial District judge for Salt Lake County, Utah in the Salt Lake City District Court. Skanchy was first appointed in January 2001, being retained in 2010.

Judge Bruce C. Lubeck is a district court judge in the U.S. state of Utah.

Anthony B. Quinn was a Utah Third Judicial District court judge for Salt Lake County, Utah. He was appointed to this position in September 1996 by Gov. Michael O. Leavitt.

Joseph C. Fratto Jr. currently presides as a Utah Third Judicial District court judge for Salt Lake County. He was appointed to the bench in 1997 by Utah Governor Michael O. Leavitt.

Glenn K. Iwasaki is a Utah attorney. He served as State Court Judge for the Third Judicial District Court, which serves Salt Lake, Summit, and Tooele counties of Utah. He was appointed to the bench in July 1992 by Governor Norman H. Bangerter, and has served there since. He retired on September 30, 2011.

Judge Frederic (Ric) Oddone is serving in the Utah Third District Juvenile Court

Pamela T. Greenwood is the former presiding judge of the Utah Court of Appeals and was a pioneer woman lawyer in the state of Utah.

William A. Thorne Jr. is a judge on the Utah Court of Appeals.

George Webster Latimer was a Utah lawyer best known for representing Lt. William Calley Jr. in his court martial for the My Lai incident. Latimer was also a justice of the Utah Supreme Court from 1946 to 1951 and one of the three original members of the U.S. Court of Military Appeals from 1951 to 1961.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grant C. Jaquith</span> American judge

Grant Colton Jaquith is an American lawyer who serves as a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims. He served as the United States attorney for the Northern District of New York from 2018 to 2020.

Michael N Martinez was the first Hispanic American lawyer in Utah. He went on to a long career in the law working in both government and private practice. He was a "vocal minority rights advocate" during his career, serving on many boards and commissions dedicated to furthering the rights of Hispanics and other people of color.

Jill McKee Pohlman is an American lawyer from Utah who serves as the as a justice of the Utah Supreme Court. From 2016 to 2022, she was an associate presiding judge of the Utah Court of Appeals.

References

  1. ↑ Andrew A. Valdez - Judgepedia Archived July 26, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  2. 1 2 3 Interview of Judge Andrew Valdez in Salt Lake City, Utah on February 28, 2011
  3. ↑ Judge Valdez Writes His Memoirs - ksl.com
  4. ↑ Andrew Valdez on KSL TV News on YouTube
  5. 1 2 3 "Elections Utah Biography" (PDF). elections.utah.gov. 2008. Retrieved March 3, 2011.
  6. 1 2 Utah State Courts - Judges' Biographies
  7. ↑ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-21. Retrieved 2011-03-13.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  8. ↑ Judge Andrew Valdez Tennis Program on YouTube
  9. ↑ Valdez, Andrew A. "No One Makes It Alone". Utah Bar Journal. Archived from the original on July 28, 2011. Retrieved March 3, 2011.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.