Provider backgrounds, area roots backlink new Santa Clara County judicial appointees

SAN JOSE — The 3 hottest additions to the Santa Clara County Remarkable Courtroom bench all arrive from steeped community service backgrounds and potent regional roots.

Micael Estremera, Kelley Paul and Rebeca Esquivel-Pedroza ended up named the South Bay’s newest judges by Gov. Gavin Newsom this month. All three are Santa Clara University alumni. Estremera and Paul are longtime deputy general public defenders in the county Esquivel-Pedroza’s earlier consists of functioning as a lawful-support legal professional and aiding lead the Remarkable Court’s self-assistance heart ahead of she became a courtroom commissioner.

Micael Estremera

Micael Estremera, 42, grew up in East San Jose, attended Bellarmine Higher education Prep and acquired his bachelor’s and legislation degrees as a Bronco. He credits his public company travel in element to his father Tony, an lawyer and previous director of the Authorized Assist Modern society of Santa Clara County, as properly as a longtime board member of the Santa Clara Valley Drinking water District, and his mom, a nurse who served on the San Jose-Evergreen Local community College or university District board.

“My household is deeply fully commited to community services,” Estremera said. “It’s what I’ve performed for most of my job as a general public defender.”

He sees a natural application of those encounters to his upcoming purpose.

“I have been in courtrooms my total job, and served my community from the courtroom for most of my career. That is afforded me a breadth of viewpoint that I hope is precious,” Estremera explained.

He added, “I’ve witnessed in excess of the a long time how impactful the courts are, and I see this as an chance to provide a broader sector and a broader swath of the neighborhood. I’m humbled and honored by the appointment it is a incredible responsibility.”

In addition to his get the job done in the general public defender’s workplace, Estremera was briefly an legal professional with the county counsel’s place of work and, after regulation university, worked at the previous San Francisco-based firm Thelen LLP. He lives in San Jose, where by he is married with two children.

Kelley Paul

Paul, 49, was born and lifted in Sunnyvale, and is an alumna of Homestead Higher Faculty, San Jose Condition College and the Santa Clara College Faculty of Law. She states her perception of assistance was instilled by her mom and dad, both educators, a industry in which her sister also is effective.

She highlighted the worth of a court docket that “includes variety of knowledge,” and mentioned she hopes to increase to that in the county.

“I’m a solitary mother of a few girls, I have developed up in this local community,” Paul reported. “I’m able to know the concerns far better, I’m in a position to relate much better because of those encounters.”

She also touts owning spent her overall vocation in a courtroom natural environment, which she stated gave her “the option practically each day to see the influence that judges can make in the life of citizens of my group.”

Paul was element of several area landmark circumstances. In 2014, she proved that a defendant in a Monte Sereno murder case was wrongfully implicated, after a paramedic treating her customer inadvertently transferred his DNA to the criminal offense scene several hours later and miles absent.

In 2020, Paul was one of two direct lawyers who secured the acquittal of a man in a death-penalty scenario involving the dying and sexual abuse of a 2-12 months-old baby, right after convincing jurors that the DNA proof and investigation that implicated him was inadequate and inconclusive. The verdict was adopted soon immediately after by the district attorney’s office’s pledge to cease charging the dying penalty.

Paul, a Mountain Check out resident who until lately experienced employed the final title Kulick, explained her selection to apply for a judgeship arrived from a reflection on her vocation to day.

“I was seeking for a new obstacle that also serves my community,” she claimed. “As a area child out of San Jose Condition, I’m not absolutely sure I envisioned this was a possibility. Coming from two schoolteachers to this, is a big deal. I glimpse forward to the chance.”

Rebeca Esquivel-Pedroza

Esquivel-Pedroza, 49, hails from East San Jose, getting graduated from Independence Superior University. She graduated from Santa Clara College with a bachelor’s degree and earned a regulation degree from the California Western College of Law in San Diego.

She reported she aims to link immigrant communities — her family moved to the United States from El Salvador — to the courts.

“This is my dwelling, this is exactly where I grew up, and wherever I felt I had the group ties,” she stated. “With the difficulties I observed rising up, I’m fascinated in demystifying the law and building it much more obtainable. I genuinely want to assist men and women have entry to the courts and the justice procedure, to have a significant experience and wander absent comprehension what transpired.”

Soon after law faculty, she was an lawyer at the San Diego Volunteer Lawyer Software. She later served as an lawyer with Bay Space Legal Aid from 2008 to 2011.

She then begun her do the job for Santa Clara County, 1st as an attorney for the county court’s self-assist heart and relatives law facilitator’s place of work, increasing to guide lawyer of that division in 2019. A yr later on, she was appointed as a court commissioner, a place licensed to carry out limited judicial obligations.