Karen Stevenson

Judge
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Chief Magistrate Judge 

00:49:49
The Portia Project - MC Sungaila | Karen Stevenson | Magistrate Judge
 

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Show Notes

Karen Stevenson, Chief Magistrate Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, shares her path to the bench and to the law, including a stint at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. She also describes how her experience living abroad expanded her perspective as a person and enhanced her judicial skills later on. Judge Stevenson exemplifies her motto: "Do it. Do it right. Do it now."

 
 

About Karen L. Stevenson:

The Portia Project - MC Sungaila | Karen Stevenson | Magistrate Judge

Magistrate Judge Karen L. Stevenson is the chief magistrate judge for the Central District of California.

Judge Stevenson has served as a magistrate judge for the Central District of California since August 10, 2015.  Before joining the bench, Judge Stevenson was Of Counsel in the Litigation Practice Group of Buchalter Nemer, APLC in Los Angeles, where she specialized in complex commercial matters, including securities litigation, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, unfair competition, and insurance coverage for policyholders.  Judge Stevenson received her Bachelor of Arts from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, her master’s degree in European history from Oxford University, England as a Rhodes Scholar, and her Juris Doctor, with distinction, from Stanford Law School.

Karen L. Stevenson

 

Transcript

I'm really pleased to have just an amazing human and just a great person, Chief Judge Karen Stevenson, Magistrate Judge in the Central District of California. Welcome.

Eclectic Beginnings: Judge Karen Stevenson's Journey

Thank you, MC. I'm so thrilled to be here. I love this topic of inspiring the next generation of judges, bench officers, lawyers, law students, and women of all fashions and tribes who aspire to anything adventurous in their lives. I don't think we practice in the field of law, but I take great joy in being a facilitator for young women and not-so-young women who want to broaden their horizons and be adventurous in their lives and in their careers and beyond.

I think obviously we want to chat about your path to the judicial bench and to becoming the chief US magistrate judge in the Central District. Also, you have such an interesting pathway in general. You follow your interests, and your interests are eclectic. I think that, at least as I see your career journey and personal journey, is that you really exemplify that following your interests and your curiosity can lead to unexpected places. 

Let me just start at the very beginning, but I won't tell my entire life story, but it's relevant to this eclectic path. I grew up in Washington, DC. My mom was a public school psychologist. There are no lawyers in my family. I didn't decide to go to law school until I was an undergraduate. I did have the opportunity growing up, I got a scholarship to go away to boarding school in Connecticut. That was great, it was very challenging because I had never really lived away from home before.

I was on scholarship there, necessarily so. I had never met people who had two houses. We had one, and I thought that was the coolest thing ever. I didn't know what Fire Island was, or where Nantucket was, or the people. High school kids went to Florida for spring break because it was fun. That introduced me to a whole new world, both socially and socioeconomically. That was the first time, and probably one of the most formative experiences of learning to be comfortable in my own skin.

There was no way in that situation that I was ever going to remake myself after anyone else who was around me. I went to the school. The first year it was co-educational after having been an all-boys school for 80 years. Starting out right at the beginning, you're going to have to just be yourself and be fully yourself. I went on to college from there at UNC Chapel Hill, did sports, and studied Russian. Why?

Just because I like the language, and I love the culture, and love the literature. One summer I spent a summer at the Russian school at Middlebury College. Many folks may know that there are fabulous language schools at Middlebury. They're absolutely famous for that. I spent eight weeks in the Russian school in Middlebury. I had the opportunity, that was my junior year and my junior year in college. My senior year in college, I had an opportunity to put together a travel study fellowship of my own design.

I was a history major, technically. You could see a trend here. I took all the classes that I was interested in, and I had tons of AP credits, so I wasn't really limited in terms of having to do a lot of basic elementary stuff. They were going in and talking to my academic advisor before graduation, and they were like, “What is your major?” I said, “What do I have the most?” I said, “You need one class to be a polysci major. You're almost you need one class to be a Russian major. It looks like you've got enough to be a history major.”

That's the one history for 500, please. My summer after I graduated from college, I had a chance to do this travel fellowship through the Warhead Foundation in Chapel Hill, where I put together a seven-week travel study program that looked at the great churches of Muscovy, Byzantium, and Rome. I flew to what was then the Soviet Union, traveled to Moscow, Kiev, what is now St. Petersburg.

Took a train from St. Petersburg down to the Black Sea to what is now part of the Crimea, took a ferry across from there to Istanbul, met up with some college buddies in Istanbul, and then traveled across country by bus through what was then Bulgaria and what was then Yugoslavia, and then took a train from Zagreb to Florence, Venice, and flew home from Rome. I was traveling by myself, except for the four days or so my buddies met up with me in Istanbul. That set a pattern of really just having an interest and pursuing it, figuring out how to go about and put it together, not being reckless, but being thoughtful about that process.

Fast forward, I was supposed to go to law school right after undergrad. I was like, “I'm just done with school. I'm so over it. I really cannot. I'm just, I cannot.” I worked for a while. I was a water aerobics instructor. I worked at a spa here in Southern California for a while. I had worked at this spa, and my boss was the CEO of the company at the time.

I looked around one day, I was like, “I don't really want his job,” but I was in a deposition as the corporate client and sitting next to our lawyer who was deposing someone else in a litigation involving the company. I remember looking over at the lawyer, going, “I want his job.” At that point, I started applying to law schools. I went to law school at Stanford and then worked for law firms. The usual route of being a junior associate, senior associate.

I was the last firm I worked with before I went on the bench. I was senior counsel for them. Honestly, and I tell that story because I was not the person who decided in kindergarten. “I'm going to be a lawyer, and I want to be a judge.” I did not. It has unfolded through hard work. Let me just emphasize hard work and having great colleagues. Many good things in my life have come through the suggestions of friends, mentors, and colleagues.

The Power Of Nudges: Unexpected Paths To The Bench

That's definitely one of the threads that I've seen through the show, but also was part of the initiative that I had hoped to do through the show was there are people who encourage you and nudge you forward in your life, or to consider things that you would not have considered for yourself. I thought to myself, “What if somebody doesn't do that for someone, but it would be helpful for them?” I thought, “Through this show, whether they have it through someone they know, maybe someone they get to know through the show, that something you say or the other guests say can inspire someone to look into something they hadn't thought about before.” I think that's so important. 

It’s important because the way I came to the bench, in fact, was a partner at my law firm walked into my office one day and said, “Karen, I'm on this mayorate selection panel for magistrate judges here in the central district. Have you ever thought of it?” I was like, “Nope.” I was very happy doing the job I was doing at the time. I said, “No, not really. I haven't really thought of it.”

I like the thrust in Paris of corporate litigation and love being in court, love being in a trial. Over the course of several weeks, two other people who did not know each other said, “Have you thought about being a magistrate judge? Another person said, “Have you?” I was like, “This is a sign of an indication. Let me just go take a look at the application, see what's involved.” Also, my firm colleague said, “Look, I have friends who are currently magistrate judges. Why don't you go over and have lunch with these two women and see what you think? Ask them about the job.”

I did. I came over to the federal court, and I had lunch with Suzanne Segal, who is a mediator now. She was the chief magistrate judge at the time. My other colleague, Alka Sagar, had been a very successful assistant United States attorney before coming on the bench. I had lunch with them. I liked them so much in meeting them. They were so smart and so dedicated. I just thought, “This might be something I'd like to pursue.” It was those personal connections that made the difference for me. You don't know what you don't know. You don't know the world beyond yourself. It takes other people to come to you sometimes and say, “Have you thought of, or you might be good at?”

I think that sometimes people see things in you that you don't see, like possibilities that you don't see. There are people that you respect and you're like, “I'll have to look into that.”

You don't know what you don't know. You don't know the world beyond yourself.

That's one of the reasons, MCY, I so enjoy having summer externs work with me in chambers. I love having young law students. I don't care if they end up not being judges or if some of them don't even like being lawyers at the end of the day. It gives them an opportunity. “Have a chance, come see what I do. Come see what the court looks like from the inside and challenge yourself.”

That's the other big theme is like taking risks sometimes and not being afraid to not always be the super duper very best at something, but put your best foot forward. Law students come and work for me in the summer many times after their first year of law school. No, they don't write like Supreme Court clerks, but I guarantee after eight weeks in our chambers and lots of tutelage and personal attention, they'll write much better than they did when they arrived. We'll go back to law school with so much more confidence.

I feel that way, teaching in law school clinics, that even if people don't decide to become appellate lawyers for their ultimate career choice, some of them do, but a lot of them don't. They'll come away from that experience, briefing and arguing a case in the Ninth Circuit, with so much great skills. They can transfer to a number of different things. If they're going to be litigators, they'll have this great insight from having done the appeal as well.

One of the things I've had the opportunity to do in the last year is I've been asked to teach a class. I'll be part of a teaching team or women, law students, and judges from Iraq who are living abroad. It has been an extraordinary experience. The dedication of these young women, their eagerness to understand the rule of law, to talk about principles, about how do you build an effective argument. We've done all this over Zoom. It's extraordinary. That's been so gratifying.

It gives you a broader perspective on our judicial system and the rule of law in general, too. 

It really does. In those classes, I  have to take into account that they have both referential to constitutional law, the state law, but also say Sharia law, which very much overlaid and has to always be taken into account in that context. That's been educational for me, but it's also been, like I say, deeply gratifying to step back and appreciate someone else's both cultural and legal context. 

That's so interesting. That's neat. I just have a question like the background. I was thinking about your original when you were saying learning Russian and doing your travels, your solo travels in some pretty unusual places. They're not touristy places, especially a little while ago. It is maybe a little more questionable. 

Back in the day, as their way.

Why Russian? Curiosity And The Challenging Path

What attracted you to Russian? What did you like about that language?

I study a lot of French in high school. French was my dominant language in high school, and I loved languages. I think at one point, I thought I would have a career, say in foreign policy or maybe work at the State Department, but I was always drawn to international affairs as it were. That didn't frame up as law school per se. Like I said, I had lots of space in my college curriculum to take a lot of things that I just wanted to. Freshman year was continuing in French because I didn't want to lose it. I thought, “I should learn another language.” I signed up for Spanish one and Russian one. In Spanish one, I was like, “It's the whole home.” I thought, “Russian is really hard and it's really interesting.”

It's a different thing.

They're romance languages. They're very similar. I've since actually gone on to spend a month studying Spanish in Costa Rica, actually this summer, before I came on the bench, because I live in a city where 54% of the population speaks some Spanish. I need to be able to speak Spanish, at least a little bit. I did later go off and study Spanish intensively, but Russia was just part of it was the nature of international relations at the time. It was very different. It was the Soviet Union, not the Russian Federation as we know it now.

It was pre-Gorbachev, pre-Perestroika, if anybody ever remembers any of those international rubrics that we were working in and very much before the nuclear plant accident at Chernobyl, which essentially led to the dissolution ultimately under Mr. Gorbachev of what was then the USSR, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and the breakup of that. We now have the Russian Federation and that constellation of countries surrounding them. It was mostly the Cyrillic alphabet, I was like, “What is that?” Really challenging.

That's one of the things I would say to young women and older women, anyone, “Don't be afraid to do the hard thing. You don't know since I know where it's going to lead.” I ended up not doing foreign relations or foreign policy or anything like that, but it was a fantastic learning opportunity. It brought me into contact with a whole world and culture. Culturally, both in terms of literature and music, and the arts that I would otherwise not have encountered in the same way. It hasn't been a straight line.

I was just curious because I know you're proficient in a number of languages, and I was like, “Why Russian?”

It is harder.

The alphabet, everything is just so different. That's neat.

It still freaks out cab drivers sometimes when I'm picking up Kathy, that I actually still remember quite a bit. 

Don't be afraid to do the hard thing. You don't know where it's going to lead.

Taking that, planning the itinerary, but then taking this solo trip through some areas that, especially given the politics at the time, were not considered somewhere challenging.

It would be challenging now. Fortunately, I would say my mom was very supportive of me. She was never like, “Don't do that. That might be dangerous.” It was never like that. I was like, “Have you planned it out? What's your itinerary? Where are you going to be? Check in with me.” Like I said, “My other folks know what my itinerary was. That trip was really driven by my love of art history.

It sounds like it when you were saying where you were going, that's pretty. 

Those places were chosen because of very specific architectural places I wanted to see and be. That's why it ended in Rome with Florence, Venice, and Rome, and then flew home from Rome.

That's a beautiful place to conclude the trip. Also, I wanted to ask you about your Rhodes Scholarship experience too.

Oxford & Beyond: The Transformative Rhodes Scholarship

I was exceedingly fortunate to win a Rhodes Scholarship and have the opportunity to study for two years at Oxford University in England. It was interesting. Again, I went to Oxford, and on my application for the Rhodes, I had said what I wanted to do was to do a master's in French and Russian. I was like, “This will be a great chance to polish up my languages, and then I'll figure out what I want to do later.” When I got to Oxford, I decided I wanted to do European history.

I did do European history and with a special paper in 19th century France, and a special paper that was particularly called Baudelaire and the Artists of His Time, where we read the entirety of Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal in French. I hadn't studied European history that much, particularly the 18th and 19th centuries. That was wonderful, but it was fantastic to live and study at Oxford University in this academic milieu that had students from all over the world. There are 32 Rhodes Scholars every year from the United States.

Currently, Rhodes Scholars are from some 30 to 40 countries now. I had the great privilege one, of being a selector for Rhodes Scholars here in Southern California for about ten years. I served as a trustee of the Rhodes Trust for twelve years. I was termed out. That's as long as you can serve. I still stay connected very much with Rhodes Scholars and the Rhodes Scholarship Program because I've found it so powerful to live and study abroad. It recalibrates how you see the world, for me, very profoundly.

How do you think it impacts your vision or your approach or others who have that opportunity?

I think, first of all, if you let it, it requires you to be quiet and listen to other people's perspectives. Really listen. Before I went to England, I had never had friends from Botswana. I had never had friends from Lesotho. I had never had friends from India or Pakistan or any other countries in the global south, what we now call the global south.

To realize, and this was really profound, living in Great Britain, we think because they speak the same language, mostly, it's not entirely fully aligned, that we fully understand that culture and I realized particularly when you live there for two years, I came home once to be in my best friend's wedding and then I jetted right back to London.

There is a different cultural experience. I was always aware, I'm an American. I was not a citizen of Great Britain. Even to say, and to understand that England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland are three very different cultural. They have a lot of shared history, but the deep cultural ties are quite unique. Just to step back and let yourself appreciate that variation and that difference is valuable. It not just opens your mind, but if you let it, it really can open your heart in a way it brings that home with you.

Bring that certain curiosity and openness to difference back with you that I just think makes me a deeper, richer individual and more curious and really tolerant. Just because you don't do it my way doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It doesn't mean I'm doing it wrong. We do it differently. You can be curious of like, “That might make sense for me to do it that way.” I think it makes you a better citizen.

Global Perspectives: How Travel Shapes a Judge's Approach

It's so interesting what you were just describing, because I was thinking a couple of things when you were saying it. The first thing was the road's journey itself and how that led to your being able to help pay it forward through serving on the board, and then interviewing and allowing others the opportunity down the road. You never could have imagined that would happen. Some of your descriptions of what you got from that or what you think people get from that experience I think, translate well to skills that you need are helpful to being a judge, actually.

They actually are. You're right in the sense that one of the things we do, magistrate judge, is one of our major responsibilities as initial appearances for defendants who have been arrested for alleged violations of federal law. They have to come before a magistrate judge and understand their rights and have counsel appointed for them. If they've been indicted, then they get arraigned. The ability to be open and responsive to people from all kinds of backgrounds who are going to appear before you. It is valuable.

I would say like, “You ultimately need to make decisions, but not making them too quickly. Like not judging things too quickly and being open.”

Not too quickly, and being respectful regardless of what an individual has done. When I see them as a magistrate judge, they have only been accused. They have not been convicted. Therefore, I want to make sure when they're in front of me that I engage with them in a way that allows them, one, to actually understand what's happening to them, understand their proceedings. Do they need an interpreter? They're entitled to an interpreter. I always tell people, “If you don't understand the interpretation that's being provided for you, make sure you let me know so we can get it sorted and make sure you understand.”

There can sometimes be variations just because someone interprets Spanish.

Just because you don't do it one way doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It doesn't mean others are doing it wrong. You just do it differently.

It may not be the right dialect. They may be from a different province, from a different village. Particularly, folks from Mexico, they not everybody speaks Spanish. The Spanish in Spain and the Spanish in Mexico are not the same. Some of the indigenous languages that are spoken in various, particularly rural parts of Mexico, do not in any way resemble the Spanish we think of here in the city.

That's a good thing. Given your experiences, be open to that and say, “We want to make sure you are understanding what's going on.” Part of that is having the proper translation.

I have to say, we have extraordinary interpreters. If anybody out there is thinking of it, I might like to be involved in the judicial system, but I'm not quite sure I want to be a judge or a lawyer. Being an interpreter either in the state or the federal court is an invaluable and well-compensated skill and a profession that is very important to allowing us to do justice. You cannot do justice if people don't understand what their responsibilities are, what their rights are, and what's going to happen next. 

It may be their first time they've ever been in a court or had experience with the justice system. Maybe you can talk about some other things that you do as a magistrate judge, and just what that looks like.

A Day In The Life: The Many Roles Of A Magistrate Judge

It looks different every day in many ways, which is one of the reasons I love this job so much, besides my colleagues and the dignity of the federal court. Our whole democracy is really built on the rule of law and the fact that our legal system is supposed to be transparent and just. Our oath is to administer justice and uphold the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and to do justice without fear or favor, that all are treated with dignity and respect. I don't care what it's alleged that you've done and to follow the law, just simply to follow the law.

On any given day, there are a of things that magistrate judges here in the central district are primarily responsible for. I mentioned initial appearances. That is our criminal side that we do. In our initial appearances, we handle indictments. We receive our returns of indictments from the grand jury. We assist with the selection, or we do jury excusals. Folks who come in they may have been asked to come in for a trial before a district judge. Magistrate judges will hear their excusals, why they cannot serve, and we can decide whether they're excused or they need to go upstairs and sit for the day or might get selected, or if they're deferred.

They cannot do it now, but they could do it in six months or a year. That's that side of the house. On the civil side of the house, we are the primary discovery judges on civil litigation. Every case that's filed in the central district of California is assigned a district judge, an Article III judge who will try that case and a magistrate judge who will handle all of the discovery disputes in the matter, 10 depositions or 12 depositions, answer these document requests, can these subpoenas be served or should they be quashed on these third parties?

We're fighting about whether the information you want is relevant or not relevant, it is proportional to the needs of the case. Do you need ten years' worth of documents to prove your case or two and a half? We handle all of those aspects on the discovery side of civil cases. We also handle settlement conferences in civil matters where the parties would like to use the services of a magistrate judge to help them resolve the case, if they can at no cost to them. This is free. We also have another category of cases that are called consent cases.

Our district judges here in the central district are, this is one of the busiest trial districts in the country, as many people know. Magistrate judges can also handle civil cases by consent. If the parties say, “Yes, I'd like to have an Article I judge versus an Article III judge handle this case for all purposes.” In which case, the case comes to a magistrate judge, such as myself or one of my colleagues, and we handle it all the way through, including the discovery all the way through trial.

If at the end of that trial any party is dissatisfied, they can go directly on appeal to the Ninth Circuit the same way they would an unfavorable result or a result they find unfavorable if their case had been tried before a district judge. That's been a real increase in the number of cases. It's a tribute to the quality of our Magistrate Judge Bench and the excellence of our magistrate judges that we're seeing increasing numbers of civil parties and lawyers from very large firms and bar associations across the city giving consent to have their cases handled for all purposes by magistrate judges.

I know there's been an increase in that, and that's certainly changed some of I'll say, like the overall complexion of what you're doing as a magistrate judge, too.

There are also lots of other smaller things that we are responsible for. For example, we have courthouses here in the Central District of California is one of the largest trial districts. We have three divisions, the Western Division here in Los Angeles, the Eastern Division in Riverside, and the Southern Division is down in Santa Ana. The Central District of California goes all the way north to the southern boundary of Monterey County. The Hearst Castle is in the Central District, and we have people in Santa Barbara, but there's no federal courthouse in Santa Barbara. We have a million and a half people who live between Ventura and Santa Barbara.

They need a federal judge. All kinds of things happen that require, that are subject to federal jurisdiction. We have military bases and VA hospitals, and all those things. Every 60 days, one of our magistrate judges will go to Santa Barbara for two days of proceedings and trials in what are essentially federal misdemeanors. It's called CVB, Central Violations Bureau. We sit in Santa Barbara and handle those matters there as well. We do citizenship swearing-in, which are wonderful, very happy occasions. Swearing in students, law students who've passed the bar. That is a real delight. All those kinds of things as well come to us sometimes.

A Judge Scott, Karen Scott, was also on the show in its very early stages. One of the things she really liked about the position was the variety of various things of that were coming in at any particular time was really fun. I guess it depends on your personality and what you enjoy. Some people enjoy just doing one certain thing all the time. This would not be for them. Also, just being open for, “Look, there's this new thing. What is this that I'm working on today?” If you enjoy that, then it's good.

A couple of things I didn't even mention are we handle all of the civil rights cases that come in. Generally, we handle them on the front end, whether they're prisoner civil rights cases, cases of citizens involving, say, wrongful death, shooting by law enforcement, those kinds of cases. We handle social security appeals. We handle those that come first to magistrate judges, and we also handle petitions for habeas corpus. Individuals who have been tried, convicted, and are serving sentences, but they say there is a constitutional error in their conviction.

The Written Word: Essential Skills For Judges & Lawyers

They seek a petition for habeas corpus, and those come first to the magistrate judges to work those cases up and issue what's called a report and recommendation to the district judge as to how those cases should be disposed. It's a lot of different things. If anybody out there is thinking about this, strong writing skills. There's a lot of writing in any case. Everybody thinks about the sexy part, the so-called sexy part of lawyering. The judge is there, banging the gavel and being in court. “You, out with you and off with your head, lawyer.”

It's not like that. It's not like TV. It's not like law and order on TV, but it does require thoughtful and really principled reflection and careful review of the papers that are filed. These are people's lives. These are people's lives. Even when people don't win their case, because, as always, you rule for someone and against someone else. Even when I rule against someone else, I want them to understand that, one, I read their papers carefully. I understand their position and that this is a prince. I want them to know why they didn't win.

That's why it's really important when I work with my law clerks, when I work with externs, the respect for the judiciary in many ways originates with understanding why we do what we do and how I got to the conclusion that I got to. Sometimes, if people feel they've been heard, then it is. They may not agree with me. They still disagree with me, but it's important that they feel like they were heard.

The ability to be open and responsive to people from all kinds of backgrounds who are going to appear before you is valuable.

You made this argument, and here's why I see it differently, and here's why the law requires differently, not just a back-of-the-hand, cursory statement. Particularly when we deal with prisoners. I remember I had an instance in one of our habeas petitions, and it clearly it was clearly not going to be able to come out the way the individual wanted. I said to my law clerks, “We've written pages and pages, and we've got all the right law in here, and the analysis is correct. I bet we're dealing with somebody who's got like a sixth-grade education.

I cannot make the law different, but let's make the font bigger so it's easier for her to read. At least she'll be able to understand how we got to where we got. I cannot make the law come out better or differently. I cannot make the law cases we're putting in here different, but I want to make it accessible. I want to make the decision accessible even to this individual who probably has a pretty limited educational background.” I think thinking about those things is important as a judge.

You're thinking about the words that you're using and how you're explaining it, but also that's another interesting point. Like, “We're going to look at font and typeface as being something that makes something more accessible or not.”

Even something as simple as that, but it's easy to overlook. For sure.

It's quite a variety of things that you're with. Can you tell me too the difference between being now that you have the chief judge role, what kinds of things do in that role? Does that also impact the amount of cases or caseload that you can take on yourself?

It does. As the chief, I have half the caseload of a regular full-time magistrate judge. Why is that? That is because part of my job is as the chief, my responsibility is to be the voice of the magistrate judge cohort on a number of administrative and governance committees at the court. Engaging, I also serve as the vice chair of the magistrate judges executive board, which is the group of chief magistrate judges from all of the geographic areas within the Ninth Circuit.

That group meets three times a year. I'm going to be on a panel this coming summer at the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference, speaking on the Bail Reform Act and how we make decisions about whether people get detention or get bond in the federal system. I make sure that things that are of importance to the magistrate judge group in the central district as a whole get disseminated we discussed that I look across policy issues that may be of import and significance to them.

I work closely with the chief district judge just to make sure that the flow of information and that we're all on the same page, and that if there are problems. Recently, I had a chance to speak with Chief Judge Gee at the conference of Chief Probation and Pre-Trial Officers. Their conference for the Ninth Circuit and engage with them about how the bench officers are engaging with them and appreciate them for the work that they do because they provide analysis and for us on pretrial determinations, detention determinations at initial appearances. They also provide supervision for the individuals we do release on bond and make sure they're doing what the court says they need to do.

I engage with the United States Marshals Service because they're moving defendants back and forth, bringing people in or not bringing people in. I forgot, a huge part of our job is what's called document duty, where any warrant for an arrest or a search or a tracer on a car that the justice department wants to execute against an individual has to be reviewed and signed by a magistrate judge certifying that there is indeed probable cause to bring this complaint or search this home or search your phone or search your email. You need a warrant for that. Magistrate judges have the primary responsibility for all of those, making those probable cause determinations and signing off on those warrants.

That's part of what we do as well. Part of my job also involves engaging with the US Attorney's Office. There are policy matters that we need to look at, making sure that across the board, we have scheduling for all of those judges and all of our court appearances, scheduling for who's on duty on document duty, making sure that I engage with the folks. Our facilities are appropriate in terms of courtroom management and things like that. All the infrastructure of making sure the judges can do their job on our side, on the magistrate's dime. For the house, I keep my finger to the wind for that and help where needed. 

Advice For Aspiring Judges: Integrity & Lifelong Learning

That's really the way you said infrastructure. I was thinking about logistics, too. I'm like, “There's a lot of logistics, aside from just the logistics of the cases in your courtroom, the larger logistics.” Cool. What advice would you give to someone who might think they might want to be a judge someday?

Depending on where you are at age and stage, if you're on the younger end, if you're in college, work as hard as you can. I may be either a bad example or a really good example of take as broad an interest in your academic studies as possible. You can major in anything. I had friends in law school who had been English professors, who had been physicians, and then came back to law school. Some folks who were bright-eyed and bushy-tongued in 23 and right out of undergrad. That's not so important.

What is important is to be deeply concerned and deeply interested in the administration of justice. Understand how our constitutional democracy works. Spend some time thinking about civics and how we can all contribute to making our communities more robust, more fair, more just, and more understanding of one another together. Have an interest in people, and really be interested in people. That's the first thing. Don't be deterred. I took time off before going to law school. I had a set of twins before I went to law school.

My twins were eighteen months old when I started as a first-year at Stanford. Ladies out there who want to have kids, if you don't want to have kids, that's great too. If you have kids, it doesn't necessarily mean you cannot be a lawyer. You cannot go to law school, or you cannot move on in any direction you want to. It's a little more complicated. It takes a little more planning, but it's not impossible. I just really want to put that out there that any time is a good time if you have the interest and care.

The other thing is, I would say in many ways, especially if you're in law school, almost more important than your grades, because five years out of law school, no one's going to care what your GPA was. Being on a law review which is useful and important for certain kinds of jobs, especially if you want a clerk. Your reputation for honesty and integrity will always precede you. I guarantee you, five years after you graduate from law school, if that's what you want to do, your community of colleagues and associates, because you will see people around and around in your career.

Sometimes they'll be on the opposite side of the courtroom. Sometimes they may be your co-counsel. It just depends. Your reputation for integrity really matters. Cherish that. Protect that. That is the currency of the realm in my mind. Being a great lawyer is having great integrity. You are not going to every case. You're going to lose some, and some of the losses are going to be painful and stinging, and you're just going to gnash your teeth.

Your character should change. Your sense of integrity, your honesty. If you do want to be a bench officer, at least on the federal side, you have to pass a very rigorous background check. Remember my application for the magistrate judge role. They wanted a list of every case you had appeared in, say, in the last ten years, the names and addresses of opposing counsel. They wanted to know what opposing counsel was going to say about you as a person and as a lawyer.

They don't want to hear from your mom. Your mom is going to say nice things about you. Hopefully, everybody's mom is going to say nice things about you. What will people say about you who have been against you in the heat of battle? Will they say, “We disagreed profoundly, but she was honest. She was straightforward. She was a person of her word.” She or he or whomever. Those are the things I hold most dear in terms of professional reputation.

It is important to be deeply concerned and interested in the administration of justice.

Even your co-counsel, that's nice. They were your co-counsel. The interest in how did you dealt with someone you were adversarial with in that proceeding. 

The other things I would say are read deeply and widely, be curious, not just about people, but about things, and read all kinds of books and magazines, and be curious about the world. 

That's good advice in general, I think, in a legal career, but definitely something that comes up in the judicial selection process for sure. What about someone who wants to be, maybe is thinking about being a lawyer or a litigator? Any difference in perspective on that? I think it's all a continuum.

It's a continuum. I would say a lawyer or a litigator, again, be able to be fiercely advocating even in an adversarial system, but with absolute integrity. The other thing I would say, and I see this even now, even as a judge, you can always be a better writer. Focus on your writing and being a clear, thoughtful communicator in the written word. I just tell my law clerks, good writing is a function of rewriting. I take that to heart for myself as well.

You can always write more succinctly, more pointedly, shorter sentences, fewer pages. I always strive to be as effective a communicator as possible. Even if you want to be a litigator, people are like, “I'm going to be in the courtroom, and I don't need to write that much. I'm a great public speaker.” No, 99% of what you do is written. That's how you convince the judge, because very few cases actually go to trial. There's a whole lot of paper that has to get filed before you go to trial as lawyers. I don't know. 

I was going to say there's always paper involved in every step. Good writing is good editing, as you said, and self-editing. 

We all have those phrases we fall in love with, the turn of a phrase. We're like, “I love that sentence. That's probably one I need to edit again.” The other thing I would say, too, is spend time away from the law. I have a group of friends that we go hiking together. We hiked in New Zealand two years ago. We hiked in Italy in the Dolomite Mountains for ten days last summer. It is good for the soul and the brain to step away from this from time to time and just rejoice in friendships and adventure if you're fortunate enough to be able to pursue those.

You don't have to go to the far ends of the world. Good long hike in the Topanga. In Topanga Canyon can be just as refreshing and invigorating. Honor and cherish your friendships outside of work because those are the things that really give you a lift on the hard days. There are hard days. Everybody has hard days.

That's such a good reminder all around, because I think we get very serious and very focused on professional things. It's important to step away so you can get perspective again, but also step away so you can maintain those friendships, too. Thank you so much for being part of the podcast and sharing a very interesting journey, and hopefully getting folks interested in maybe not only becoming judges, but maybe magistrate judges. Great job.

Best job I ever had. I love my job. 

I know you do. It's been amazing to see you blossom in that role.

Life Lessons & Lightning Round: Poetry, Heroes, And Mottos

Thank you so much for inviting me and for having me, and to those who are viewing the show. I wish you only the best in whatever your adventure may be, whether it's law or the judiciary, or something completely different. Put your whole heart into it. That's what really gives us joy wherever our career is.

I think of you as whatever you do, you do your very best, and you have a level of excellence in what you do because you have those high-level expectations for yourself. “I'm going to do my very best at whatever I'm doing.” Usually, I end with just a few lightning round questions. I want to ask first, which talent do you not have, but would you most like to have?

Writing poetry, like being a novel. Being a novel. Creative writing, that's the one. 

Speaking of that, I'll say who some of your favorite writers are?

I am reading Alice Munro. I love her stories. Someone just gave me a collection of poems by Nikki Giovanni, who was a favorite poet of mine from high school all the way until now, as she recently passed. Toni Morrison. That was a brilliant writer. That's one of my big three. I cannot think of the others, but those are the three that come to mind immediately.

Cool. I always said there's good advice. I always like to get good references about authors I should be reading if I haven't read. I was like to ask that question. 

If you haven't read Alice Munro, you should. Her short stories are amazing. 

Your reputation for honesty and integrity will always precede you as a lawyer.

No, I've read hers. It's very good. Who is your hero in real life? Someone you know.

Not someone from like history or school or the movie screen. In real, boy, there are several. I would say, who would it be? Pass, I'll come back.

For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

Friends. 

Given the choice of anyone in the world or any group of people in the world, who would you invite as a dinner guest? They could be living or not.

Who would I invite as a dinner guest? I would invite Abraham Lincoln. I would invite Harriet Tubman. I would invite Gandhi. You cannot invite too many people, then you cannot have a good conversation. I would invite John F. Kennedy. It's an eclectic bunch.

That's an interesting selection. Also like eclectic, and I also like the conversations those people would have with each other, which would be really interesting too. The individual conversations but like the group. It will be very interesting.

The question I skipped was?

Your hero in real life.

My mom.

Last question, what is your motto if you have one?

Do it, do it right, do it now.

That's really fitting. Yes, that's right. I especially like the do it right. That's awesome. I think that fits. I think you act in accordance with your motto. Judge Stevenson, thank you so much for joining the show.

Thank you. It's been a real honor and a pleasure.

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Laurie Earl