California appoints 14 Superior Court judges, including 2 in Sacramento and 1 in Yolo

California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday announced the appointment of 14 Superior Court judges across the state, including positions in Sacramento and Yolo counties.

Carlton Davis of Roseville and Julie Yap of Sacramento have been appointed to serve as judges in the Sacramento Superior Court, while Daniel Wolk of Davis was appointed to the Yolo County Superior Court, according to a news release from Newsom’s office. Davis steps into a newly created position, while Yap and Wolk fill vacancies left by retiring judges.

Davis, 41, served as the deputy district attorney in Riverside County from 2003 to 2006 before holding the same title in Sacramento County from 2006 to 2017, where he also served as the court commissioner for the Sacramento County Superior Court since 2017. Davis received his juris doctor degree from the University of Southern California School of Law.

Yap, 39, served at the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California from 2005 to 2011 before serving as a U.S. Supreme Court fellow in the Administrative Office of the United States from 2011 to 2012. Yap worked as an associate from 2012 to 2016 at Seyfarth Shaw LLP, where she was also a partner from 2016 to 2019. Yap also brings more than a decade of academic experience as a former adjunct professor at the University of the Pacific’s McGeorge School of Law.

Wolk, 42, worked as an associate attorney at McDonough, Holland and Allen P.C. from 2005 to 2008, while also working as founder and director of the Legal Clinic of Yolo County from 2006 to 2008. Wolk has served as a deputy county counsel in the Office of the Solano County Counsel since 2009. He received a juris doctor degree from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law.

Women made up eight of the governor’s appointments. Each judge will receive more than $214,000 annually.

In 2019, Newsom appointed 16 judges from a pool of 461 applicants, with 69 percent of appointees being women, according to data collected by the Judicial Council of California. Since 2007, the number of women serving as trial court judges in California has increased from 398 to more than 600.

This story was originally published April 28, 2020 at 7:34 PM.