Law

2021 Judge in Residence

Event Details

  • Speaker: The Honorable Leondra Kruger
  • Event Title: “ A talk with Dean Verna Williams and The Honorable Leondra Kruger”
  • Date: March 25, 2021
  • Time: 12:15 – 1:15 p.m.
  • CLE: Application pending for 1.0 hour of CLE in OH and KY.
  • Registration: Register Online

About the Event

Justice Leondra R. Kruger, an Associate Justice on the California Supreme Court, will engage in a town hall with the College of Law community moderated by Dean Verna Williams. The discussion will cover effective advocacy, Justice Kruger’s path to the bench, and her most notable opinions, which span criminal law, local law, employment law, statutory interpretation, California constitutional law, and the First Amendment.

Biography

Judge Leondra Kruger.

The Honorable Leondra R. Kruger was appointed to the California Supreme Court in November 2014, confirmed by the Commission on Judicial Appointments on December 22, 2014, and sworn in by the Governor on January 5, 2015.

Immediately before joining the court, Justice Kruger served in the United States Department of Justice as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel.  From 2007 to 2013, she served in the Department as an Assistant to the Solicitor General and as Acting Deputy Solicitor General.  During her tenure in the Office of the Solicitor General, she argued 12 cases in the United States Supreme Court on behalf of the federal government.  In 2013 and in 2014, she received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service, the Department’s highest award for employee performance.

Justice Kruger had previously been in private practice, where she specialized in appellate and Supreme Court litigation, and taught as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Chicago Law School. 

A native of the Los Angeles area, Justice Kruger attended high school in Pasadena.  She received her bachelor’s degree with high honors from Harvard College, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.  She received her J.D. from Yale Law School, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the Yale Law Journal.  Following graduation, she served as a law clerk to Judge David S. Tatel of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and to Justice John Paul Stevens of the United States Supreme Court.