JUDGES APPOINTED IN 4TH AND 7TH DISTRICTS
GOVERNOR APPOINTS JURISTS IN RESPONSE TO
RETIREMENT, NEW JUDGESHIP

(BOISE) – Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter today filled a new judgeship established by the Legislature effective July 1 in the Boise-based 4th Judicial District and appointed a replacement for a retiring judge in eastern Idaho’s 7th Judicial District.

In Boise, Ada County Deputy Prosecutor Patrick H. Owen was named to the 4th District Court effective immediately. The new position was created by the Legislature this year to help alleviate the heavy caseload in Idaho’s most populous judicial district.

In Idaho Falls, attorney Joel E. Tingey was named to succeed retiring 7th District Judge Richard St. Clair effective August 31.

They were selected from among four nominees the Idaho Judicial Council submitted to Governor Otter for each position.

Owen, 54, is a Virginia native with a law degree from Cornell University. He has been a deputy Ada County prosecutor since May 1993, and previously practiced law in Alaska. His prosecutorial work included helping to create the Ada County Adult Felony Drug Court in 1998, and a role as lead or sole prosecutor in five first-degree murder trials. Owen and his wife Teresa have two children.

Tingey, 51, has practiced with the Idaho Falls law firm Anderson Nelson Hall Smith since 1988, and previously with the Boise firm Brady & McDaniel. The graduate of Brigham Young University and BYU’s J. Reuben Clark Law School is an Idaho Falls native. Tingey and his wife, Stacey, have four sons.

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