Deborah Brown

Chief Legal Officer Deborah Brown oversees Audit Services, Human Resources, and Legal Services at the Judicial Council of California.

Ms. Brown joined the Judicial Council staff in 1998 and worked in several positions in the Legal Services office, including attorney, supervising attorney, and managing attorney, before serving as chief counsel from 2013 to 2024. In that role, she was responsible for overseeing the Judicial Council’s Legal Services office and providing a full range of legal advice and services to the trial and appellate courts, the Chief Justice, the Judicial Council, and Judicial Council advisory bodies.

Before joining the Judicial Council, she worked for the law firm of Landels Ripley & Diamond, LLP, where her practice included employment and labor law counseling, training, and litigation. She also worked as a judicial law clerk for Magistrate Judge Wayne D. Brazil (Ret.) in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Ms. Brown received her law degree from the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, where she graduated Order of the Coif, and a bachelor’s degree in psychology and Spanish from the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she graduated with high honors and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa.