Fil-Am in Federal Court proud of her roots
WASHINGTON DC – Three months into her new job as an Associate Justice of the Washington DC Superior Court, Judge Maribeth Raffinan is the highest ranking Filipino-American in a federally-administered court.
The daughter of doctors Jun and Maria Raffinan of Cebu, she reached out to fellow Filipinos during an event of the Philippine American Chamber of Commerce and the Philippine American Bar Association of Metro DC.
“We started in a small town of Hillsboro where the population of that town was about 6,000 people but there was about 5 Filipino families there and I can tell you this, we dominated that town!”, she told them in jest.
From that small town in Ohio, the Raffinans moved to Tampa, Florida where her parents had a successful medical practice. Now a parent herself, Judge Raffinan has found her biggest fans in her husband, their 4-year-old daughter and 19-month-old Jonah.
“When the kids get to see their mom as a judge, the kids are really proud of their mom. It’s a great accomplishment and we’re very proud of her”, her husband, Efrem Levy, said.
Rafinan spent 11 years with the Public Defenders Office before President Barrack Obama named her to the post last October.
Fil-Am lawyers helped push her appointment in the White House.
She was confirmed by the US Senate in December and has a fixed term of 15 years.
“It’s important for the judiciary to have a lot of diversity on the bench because it brings a lot of different values and perspectives to the bench and it’s important to think about where you came from and as a Filipino-American i think that’s what’s important to me”, Rafinan said.
At age 40, Justice Raffinan’s road in the judiciary is long and full of promise, but for now, she says she’s just focused at being a good and fair judge.
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