State Bar Names Kim as Interim Chief Trial Counsel

Thursday, September 1, 2011

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State Bar Names Kim as Interim Chief Trial Counsel

By SHERRI M. OKAMOTO, Staff Writer

State Bar Executive Director Joseph Dunn yesterday announced the selection of Assistant U.S. Attorney Jayne Kim to serve as interim chief trial counsel.

Kim, 42, previously worked for the bar’s Office of Chief Trial Counsel as a staff prosecutor and as assistant chief trial counsel before leaving for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Los Angeles in 2008.

She is set to assume her new State Bar duties Sept. 14, and work out of the Los Angeles office. She succeeds James Towery, who resigned after serving a little less than a year in the post.

Outgoing State Bar President Bill Hebert remarked that Kim “is very impressive and totally committed to public protection.” She also “understands that we are looking for a change agent in OCTC, and she is more than up to that task, ” Hebert said.

Kim said in a statement she was “honored to take on this assignment,” in which she has set “a zero/zero goal,” which would entail “getting the State Bar’s backlog down to zero and assuring that there is zero tolerance for attorney misconduct in California.”

She added that it was “clear to me that I am expected to serve as a change agent in OCTC,” and has retained retired San Mateo District Attorney James Fox as a consultant.

Fox “will help me develop structural changes and training programs, bringing his wealth of experience as a successful prosecutor to complement mine as we address the issues confronting OCTC,” Kim said.

Kim graduated from the University of Wisconsin, Madison before attending law school at the University of Minnesota. She joined the State Bar in 1994.

During her earlier tenure with the State Bar, Kim was involved in the prosecution of the principals of the Trevor Law Group, three Beverly Hills attorneys who resigned from the State Bar rather than face charges of unfair business practices. The three had filed suit against hundreds of business owners charging consumer law violations, engaging in such abusive tactics as joining massive numbers of unrelated defendants.

Earlier this year, Kim persuaded a federal judge to impose a three-year prison term on a former South Bay surgeon convicted of fraudulently billing insurance companies for elective procedures that were not covered, not performed, or unnecessary.