Ronald M. George

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Ronald Marc George (born March 11, 1940) is the current and 27th Chief Justice of California, where he heads the Supreme Court of California. He was appointed to his current position by Governor Pete Wilson in May 1996. He has an B.A. from Princeton University, a J.D. from Stanford Law School and has served on the Supreme Court since 1991.

Prior to his appointment to the Supreme Court by Wilson, George had been appointed to the California Court of Appeal by Governor George Deukmejian in 1987, the Los Angeles Superior Court by Governor Edmund Brown, Jr. in 1977, and the Los Angeles Municipal Court by Governor Ronald Reagan in 1972.

George presided over the trial of Hillside Strangler Angelo Buono in 1981, when he was a superior court judge. George was widely lauded for his extremely unusual decision to deny the motion by Los Angeles County District Attorney's office to dismiss all 10 counts of murder against Buono. The prosecutors felt the evidence against Buono was so weak that it did not justify even an attempt to win at trial. Although judges rarely second guess the prosecutors' judgment on such a matter (and George noted his own reservations about doing so in making his decision), George's review of the evidence in the case caused him to feel so strongly that the prosecutors were in error that he did exactly that. George reassigned the case to the California Attorney General's office, and that office successfully convicted Buono on nine of the 10 counts. Thus, it was recognized that the judge, through his bold action to deny the earlier motion to dismiss, had ultimately prevented a serial killer from going free.

George is occasionally floated as a candidate for justice of the United States Supreme Court as a conservative acceptable to Democrats. In fact, according to a July 13, 2005 article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Democratic United States Senator Barbara Boxer suggested George as a potential nominee for the seat on the Court vacated by Sandra Day O'Connor's resignation, describing both George and his fellow California Supreme Court justice, Kathryn Werdegar, as "Republicans who 'reflect the spirit of Sandra Day O'Connor's tenure – independent and nonideological.'"