Supreme Court Appoints Miriam Krinsky and Hernán Vera to the State Bar Board of Trustees

August 26, 2013

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Supreme Court Appoints Miriam Krinsky and Hernán Vera to the State Bar Board of Trustees

San Francisco—The Supreme Court announced the appointments of Attorneys Miriam Krinsky and Hernán Vera to the State Bar Board of Trustees. Their terms will commence October 12, 2013, and end at the conclusion of the annual board meeting in 2016.

These are the Supreme Court’s second and third appointments to the State Bar Board of Trustees, made pursuant to Legislation effective January 1, 2012, changing the composition and name of the State Bar Board of Governors. The new Board of Trustees will include a total of five appointments by the Supreme Court, one in 2012 and two each year for 2013 and 2014.

The legislation (see Business and Professions Code section 6010 et seq.) changed the board membership from a total of 23 members, 17 elected attorneys and 6 public members appointed by the Legislature and Governor, to a 19-person board. The newly composed board ultimately will include 5 attorneys appointed by the Supreme Court, 6 attorneys elected by districts determined by the Courts of Appeal districts, 6 public members, and two attorneys appointed by the Speaker of the Assembly and the Senate Committee on Rules.

The Supreme Court was assisted in selecting appointees to the State Bar Board of Trustees by its seven-member State Bar Trustees Nominating Committee. The work of the committee is governed by Rule 9.90, which describes the factors to be considered in soliciting, reviewing and recommending to the court potential appointees to the board, as well as the general operation of the committee.

Miriam Aroni Krinsky is an educator, a public advocate for juvenile justice and child welfare, and a former federal prosecutor. She teaches child welfare policy and juvenile law to graduate students at the University of California at Los Angeles School of Public Policy and to law students at Loyola Law School in Southern California. She is a member of the Judicial Council’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Children in Foster Care and a Policy Consultant to The California Endowment.

She recently served as Executive Director of the Los Angeles County Citizens’ Jail Commission and as Executive Director of the Children’s Law Center of Los Angeles. Before that, Ms. Krinsky was a federal criminal prosecutor in the Los Angeles U.S. Attorney’s Office, where she served as chief of the general crimes and criminal appellate sections, as chair of the solicitor general’s national appellate advisory group, and received the Department of Justice John Marshall Award for her appellate work.

In addition, Ms. Krinsky has previously served as president of the Los Angeles County Bar Association and as chair of the California Bench-Bar Coalition.  She was appointed as a voting member to the Judicial Council of California in 2009 and served on a number of the council’s internal committees. She recently worked with the Administrative Office of the Courts’ Center for Families, Children and the Courts as a special consultant on the creation of the statewide Child Welfare Council. She has testified extensively before legislative, governmental, and judicial bodies, authored numerous articles, and lectured nationwide on criminal law, child welfare, and appellate issues.

Ms. Krinsky graduated with a B.A. from University of California, Los Angeles, summa cum laude, and received her J.D., Order of the Coif, also from University of California, Los Angeles.

Hernán Diego Vera is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Public Counsel, the largest pro bono law firm in the nation. Previously, he was Directing Attorney at the Consumer Law Project, Counsel Litigation Associate at O'Melveny & Myers LLP in Los Angeles, and Education Staff Attorney at the Mexican American Defense and Educational Fund. He also served as Law Clerk to the Honorable Consuelo B. Marshall of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

He has been appointed to the Board and the Executive Committee of the State Justice Institute and as a lawyer representative to the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference. He is a member of the Steering Committee of the Open Courts Coalition, the Chancery Club, the State Bar of California, the Mexican American Bar Association, the Los Angeles County Bar Association, and the Beverly Hills Bar Association. He has served on the boards of the California Reinvestment Coalition and the Los Angeles Center for Law and Justice.

In 2012, Mr. Vera was named by the Daily Journal as one of the top 100 California lawyers and received the Alumnus of the Year Award from the UCLA La Raza Law Students Association. In 2009, he received the Nonprofit Excellence Award from the Center for Nonprofit Management, and in 2004, he was named by the Daily Journal as one of California's Top 20 lawyers under the age of 40. He has published numerous opinion pieces and articles on public interest law issues, poverty, and the needs of disadvantaged communities.

Mr. Vera graduated with a B.A., with distinction, from Stanford University, and received his J.D. from University of California, Los Angeles.