Members of the legal community gathered over the weekend in Denver to celebrate the influx of Black women into the state’s judiciary over the past four years, the result of a deliberate campaign to increase diversity after Colorado recently came close to having no Black district court judges sitting on the bench.

Now, 4% of the state’s judiciary consists of Black judges, which is equal to Black representation in Colorado as a whole.

On Saturday, judges, lawyers and others gathered at Cableland, the official residence of Denver’s mayor, to honor 19 Black women currently or formerly serving at various levels of the judiciary, most of whom ascended to the bench in 2019 or later.

“That is a monumental accomplishment. They heard the call. They stepped up,” said Tyrone Glover, president of the Sam Cary Bar Association, a membership group for Black lawyers.

The honorees came almost exclusively from four areas of the state: Denver, Arapahoe, Adams and El Paso counties.

The recent push to diversify the bench included multiple players – most prominently, retired Denver County Court Judge Gary M. Jackson. Jackson’s “call to action” came in October 2018, when the retirement of William D. Robbins from Denver’s District Court threatened to leave Colorado with no sitting Black district judges. 

“I want to give kudos to our governor. I want to give kudos to those diverse judicial nominating commissions in those metropolitan areas,” said Jackson.

In 2019, the Colorado Judicial Institute and Colorado Bar Association formed the Diversity on the Bench Coalition. Around that time, the legislature also authorized a position within the judiciary to oversee recruitment efforts designed to bring in diverse judges.

A year later, Essence magazine reported on the early results. By that time, Gov. Jared Polis had selected more Black women to be judges than all previous governors combined.

“I am honored to appoint several highly qualified and dedicated Black women to serve in Colorado’s judicial branch – it’s about time!” Polis told the magazine in a statement.

Those honored at the 2023 Judges’ Salute, sponsored by the Sam Cary Bar Association and the Colorado Association of Black Women Attorneys, came to their positions in different ways. Many were appointed by Polis or his predecessor, John Hickenlooper, to district or county courts. Municipal and Denver County Court judges were the product of mayoral appointments. Finally, magistrates are hired by the courts themselves to assist with workloads.

However, there are currently no Black members of the Colorado Supreme Court or the Court of Appeals. Karen M. Ashby, one of the honorees who is the only Black woman to serve on the Court of Appeals to date, retired in 2019. A recent analysis from Colorado Politics also found virtually no Black attorneys appeared before either appellate court to argue cases last year.

“I had never met a Black female judge until I got to law school,” said Tiera Brown, vice president of the Sam Cary Bar Association. “Actually, the first Black judge that I ever saw was Judge Gary Jackson. So, to see Black women judges, that was an eye-opener for me and I realize that I am in the room with giants.”

“Clair Huxtable was my inspiration,” added Danielle Rash of the Denver City Attorney’s Office, referring to the matriarch in “The Cosby Show.”

Attorney General Phil Weiser warned against being “complacent with the progress we achieved” and praised the early trailblazers who are “making sure others will follow.”

Two people in particular were singled out for catalyzing the influx of Black judges: retired Denver County Court Judge Claudia Jordan, the first Black woman appointed to a judgeship in Colorado, and Jackson.

“This is the second time I’ve been to Cableland,” said Arapahoe County Court Judge Cheryl Rowles-Stokes. “The last time I was here was over 30 years ago. … Judge Gary Jackson was presenting to me, in this building, my scholarship from the Sam Cary Bar Association.”

The judges honored at the event were:

? Karen M. Ashby, retired from the Court of Appeals

? LaQunya Baker, Arapahoe County Court

? Nikea T. Bland, Denver District Court

? Angela Boykins, Denver magistrate

? Dianne Briscoe, retired from the Denver County Court

? Samorreyan Burney, El Paso County Court

? Catherine Cary, Denver magistrate

? Jill D. Dorancy, Denver District Court

? Olympia Z. Fay, Denver County Court

? Yolanda Fennick, El Paso County Court

? Reneé Goble, Denver County Court

? Gina Hickman, Aurora Municipal Court

? Frances Johnson, El Paso County District Court

? Claudia Jordan, retired from the Denver County Court

? Phelicia Kossie-Tonje, Adams County magistrate

? Dea M. Lindsay, Boulder County district court

? Pax Moultrie, Denver Juvenile Court

? Cheryl Rowles-Stokes, Arapahoe County Court

? Tanya Wheeler, Denver County Court

Following the event, Wheeler announced she will resign her seat to take a position with the attorney general’s office.

All of the honorees received a print of “Justice is a Black Woman,” a digitally-created, minimalist portrait of “Lady Justice” created by artist and 2021 University of North Carolina law school graduate Morgan English.

“All the images of Lady Justice were of a white woman, so I felt empowered to create an image in my style that would reimagine Lady Justice as identifiably Black,” English said. “It was beautiful to be at an event with women that have reached the peak of the legal profession in Colorado.”

The attendees also included Colorado Supreme Court Justices Monica M. Márquez and William W. Hood III, U.S. Magistrate Judge S. Kato Crews, the leaders of the Colorado and Denver bar associations, and the head of judicial diversity outreach, Sumi Lee.