Thursday, February 7, 2008
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Superior Court Judge Stanley M. Weisberg to Retire
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Stanley M. Weisberg said yesterday that he is stepping down from the bench after more than 20 years of service.
Weisberg, 64, will officially retire April 11, although his last day at work will be Feb. 29.
Currently sitting in the Northwest District at the Van Nuys East Courthouse, Weisberg was first appointed to the bench in 1986 as a municipal court judge by then-Gov. George Deukmejian. He was subsequently appointed to the Superior Court in 1988 by Deukmejian.
Weisberg graduated from Hamilton High School in Los Angeles in 1961, and then attended college at UCLA where he graduated in 1965 with a degree in political science. He then stayed at UCLA to attend law school, graduating in 1968.
He was admitted to the State Bar of California in 1969, and took a job as a deputy district attorney that year. He remained at the office until his appointment to the bench, ultimately being assigned to the office’s Organized Crime Division.
Weisberg gained notoriety when he presided over the trials of brothers Joseph Lyle Menendez and Erik Galen Menendez, who were convicted of the 1989 shotgun murders of their parents Jose and Kitty Mendez in Beverly Hills.
Although the brothers’ 1993 trial ended in two deadlocked juries, both were later convicted of two counts of first degree murder, plus conspiracy to commit murder in a second, less-publicized trial before a single jury in 1996, and Weisberg sentenced the brothers to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Weisberg is also believed to be part of one of the first-ever pairs of husband and wife judges on a Los Angeles County court; his wife, then-Superior Court Judge Jacqueline L. Weiss, presided over a court in the Santa Monica Courthouse at the time of his elevation to the Superior Court. She has since retired from the bench.
Copyright 2008, Metropolitan News Company