Chief Justice
Richard Barajas (Ret.)
Recipient,
Presidential Award for Victim Services
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Chief
Justice Richard Barajas (Ret.), is a 1971 graduate of Cathedral High
School. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from
Baylor University in Waco, Texas in 1974. In 1977, he received his Juris
Doctor from the Baylor School of Law and was admitted to the State Bar
of Texas that same year. He served in the United States Naval Judge
Advocate General's Corps as a legislative attorney on Capitol Hill in Washington,
D.C. In 1988 he was elected District Attorney for the 83rd Judicial District
of Texas and in 1991 he was appointed by the governor of Texas to the Eighth
District Court of Appeals in El Paso. On January 1, 1994 he was appointed
Chief Justice. He retired from elected judicial service and took the non-elected
status of senior justice in August 2006. He is currently assigned to the
Eighth District Court of Appeals.
Chief
Justice Barajas is a former faculty member of the National Judicial College
in Reno, Nevada, where he was an instructor on the use of information technology.
In addition, he has served on the board of the National Organization for
Victims Assistance, an organization which provides national advocacy for
victims of crime, direct services those crime victims when not otherwise
available, and assistance to professional colleagues. A nationally recognized
lecturer on the proper balancing of the constitutional rights between the
criminal defendant and the intended victim, Chief Justice Barajas was honored
by the President of the United States at a White House ceremony as a national
recipient of the Presidential
Award for Victim Services. In addition,
he is a frequent lecturer on topics relating to judicial ethics, educational
leadership and mentoring, the applicability of federal constitutional protections
to the parochial school setting, the separation of church and state (as
it relates to the issue of school vouchers), and various aspects of educational
management.
Since
his retirement from elected judicial service, Chief Justice Barajas has
moved into academia where he currently holds the position of Assistant
Principal, as well as the Director, Center for Advanced Studies at his
alma mater, Cathedral High School. Chief Justice Barajas is an instructor
of Political Science, teaching both GOVT 2305 American Government and Politics,
and GOVT 2306 State and Local Government. In addition, he is an instructor
of Education, teaching EDUC 1305, Mastering Academic Excellence.
The
Chief and his wife Cathy Jean make their home in El Paso. They have four
children, Melanie Getiñah, a graduate of Baylor University, son Brian Robert,
a 2000 graduate of Cathedral High School and a graduate of the University
of Texas at El Paso; son Richard Edward, a 2003 graduate of Cathedral High
School and likewise a graduate of the University of Texas at El Paso; and
son Tyler Spurgin, of El Paso, Texas. |
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