Gonzalez appointed to state Supreme Court

OLYMPIA – King County Superior Court Judge Steven Gonzalez was appointed Tuesday to the state Supreme Court, becoming the second Hispanic justice to serve on Washington state’s high court.

Gonzalez will replace Justice Gerry Alexander, who retires at the end of the year due to mandatory retirement laws.

Gov. Chris Gregoire announced the appointment Tuesday at the Temple of Justice in Olympia to loud cheers and a standing ovation. Gregoire said that Gonzalez’s experience as a superior court judge, assistant U.S. attorney and assistant city attorney “makes him exceptionally well qualified to serve as a justice on our highest court.”

Gonzalez will be only the second justice of Hispanic heritage to serve on the state Supreme Court, court spokeswoman Wendy Ferrell said. Charles Z. Smith, who was the state’s first ethnic minority on the court, was appointed in 1988 and served until 2002 when he stepped down after reaching the state’s mandatory retirement age of 75. Smith is an African-American of Cuban descent.

Gonzalez said that growing up in Claremont, Calif., he worked as a janitor while in high school, cleaning bathrooms at public parks.

“Education was a great opportunity for me,” he said.

Estela Ortega, executive director of El Centro De La Raza, a Seattle Latino group, said that Gonzalez’ life experience is “valuable in the court, and for our community in general.”

“It gives our community a lot of hope,” she said. “Our young kids who are coming up who can see a role model like Steve Gonzalez.”

Gregoire noted that one side of Gonzalez’s family was from Mexico, and the other side from Eastern Europe and that he was fluent in Japanese, Chinese and Spanish.

“I don’t think that anyone can deny that Judge Gonzalez brings a unique background, a unique perspective to our Washington state Supreme Court,” she said.

Gonzalez was appointed to the King County Superior Court in March 2002 and was elected by voters later that same year. He was re-elected in 2004 and 2008.

Prior to his time on the court, he was an assistant U.S. attorney in the state’s western district, during which time he helped prosecute Ahmed Ressam, an Algerian national who later was convicted on multiple counts for plotting to bomb Los Angeles International Airport. Custom agents found explosives in the trunk of his car in Port Angeles, Wash., when he drove off a ferry from Canada.

From 1996 to 1997, Gonzalez worked as a trial attorney in the domestic violence unit for the City of Seattle.

Gonzalez received his law degree from the University of California, Berkeley’s law school and was admitted to the Washington state bar in 1991. He lives in Seattle with his wife, Michelle Gonzalez, who is the assistant dean at the University of Washington Law School, and their two children.