Governor fills four judicial vacancies

Gov. Mark Dayton has named four veteran attorneys to fill vacancies at Hennepin County District Court and Minnesota Tax Court.

James A. Moore and Kristin Siegesmund will fill vacancies created by the retirements of Judges David Duffy and Lucy Wieland in the Fourth Judicial District, which includes Hennepin County.

Moore, 53, of Plymouth, is litigation manager for the City of Minneapolis Civil Division, where he supervises all litigation for the city. He previously worked as an assistant city attorney for the civil divisions of both Minneapolis and Bloomington. Moore is a 1985 graduate of Hamline University School of Law and is active on the Minnesota State Bar Association's Civic Education Committee.

Siegesmund, 57, of St. Louis Park, has served as managing/supervising attorney for multiple divisions at Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid. She is a former staff attorney with the Minnesota Disability Law Center and commercial litigator at Faegre Baker Daniels, LLP. She is a 1980 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School and has served as chairwoman of the St. Louis Park Human Rights Commission.

Dayton also appointed Bradford Delapena and Joanne Turner to the Minnesota Tax Court, filling vacancies left by the departures of Judge Sheryl Ramstad and Judge Kathleen Sanberg.

Delapena, 49, of St. Paul, is a solo practitioner at Bradford Delapena Ltd. where he specializes in appellate law and tax matters. He was tax litigation division manager for the Minnesota attorney general and a former assistant state public defender. He is a 1991 graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School and adjunct law professor at the University of Minnesota.

Turner, 56, of Bloomington, is assistant commissioner for the Minnesota Supreme Court, where she reviews appeals and records from the Tax Court. She was a partner in the Minneapolis firm Mackall, Crounse & Moore, PLC, where she practiced commercial litigation, appeals and intellectual property defense. Turner was an assistant professor of accounting and taxation at Ohio State University and the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York. She is a 1992 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School.