Washington Courts: Press Release Detail

Supreme Court inauguration ceremony included swearing-in of Justice Debra L. Stephens as new chief justice; newly-appointed Raquel Montoya-Lewis as justice

On Monday, January 6th at 9:30 a.m., Justice Debra Stephens was sworn in as the newest Chief Justice of the Washington State Supreme Court; along with the official swearing in of Raquel Montoya-Lewis as a justice on the court. Montoya-Lewis was appointed by Governor Jay Inslee in December to fulfill the remainder of Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst’s term of office, following her announcement that she would retire in January.

• Chief Justice-Elect Debra L. Stephens was recently elected by her peers as the 57th chief justice of the Court. Stephens has been a member of the Washington State Supreme Court since January 2008 and previously served as a judge on Division Three of the Court of Appeals. She is the first judge from Division Three to serve on the Washington State Supreme Court, as well as the first woman from Eastern Washington to do so. A native of Spokane, Washington, she practiced law and taught as an adjunct professor at Gonzaga University School of Law prior to taking the bench. She appeared as counsel over 125 times in the Washington State Supreme Court, in addition to appearances in the Idaho Supreme Court, in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and as counsel of record in the United States Supreme Court.
• Justice Raquel Montoya-Lewis served as a Superior Court Judge for Whatcom County starting in 2014 until her appointment by Governor Jay Inslee to the Washington State Supreme Court. Prior to serving on the Superior Court bench, she combined judicial and academic careers, serving as Chief Judge for the Lummi Nation, the Nooksack Indian Tribe & the Upper Skagit Indian Tribe and as an Associate Professor of Law at Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies at Western Washington University. She also served as an appellate judge for the Nisqually Tribe and the Northwest Intertribal Court System. Her work as a tribal court judge spanned 15 years. During that time, she worked with tribes all over the country, hearing trials as well as working on tribal court development, working with tribal communities to create legal systems that reflected the needs of those communities and their approaches to conflict resolution and justice. 

Washington is one of 11 states currently with a majority of women serving on the highest court. For full biographies, please visit www.courts.wa.gov. For TVW broadcast channel information, or to view coverage live online, visit www.tvw.org/watch/?eventID=2020011000.