In a few weeks we will celebrate the swearing-in of Jacobsen Orr shareholder-alumnus Ryan C. Carson as the newest District Court Judge of the Ninth Judicial District.  The Ninth Judicial District includes Kearney, Buffalo County and Grand Island, Hall County.  The District Courts are the highest level of trial court in the Nebraska judicial branch.  Ryan’s appointment to the District Court bench was made by Governor Ricketts after emerging from a field of qualified candidates under Nebraska’s judicial nominating commission system.

As we make the required arrangements and redistribute his caseload prior to Ryan’s departure from the firm, I’m reminded that this is the third time in the history of the Jacobsen Orr firm that we have given up a valued shareholder to public service as a Judge of the District Court.  Other Jacobsen Orr shareholder-alumni to have the honor to serve as Nebraska District Court Judge are William T. Wright and Terri S. Harder.  Bill Wright served the Ninth Judicial District as a District Court Judge, after over 30 years of private practice with Jacobsen Orr, from 2007 until his retirement in 2018.  Judge Terri Harder continues to serve as a District Court Judge in the Tenth Judicial District (comprised of a group of counties south of the Platte River, including Hastings, Minden and Holdrege) since her appointment in 1999, after 14 years of private practice with Jacobsen Orr.

I am pleased to have had the chance to practice with all three of our alumni judges as colleagues and friends.  We have as a goal when recruiting our lawyers to the firm that we will hire the kind of people with the talent and skill that others will want to try to hire them away from us.  I am reminded that includes the State of Nebraska when it calls with the lure of service to the public as a judge, which is a difficult one to resist for those who feel the calling to serve in that fashion.

Although we hate to see him leave private practice with us, I speak for the entire Jacobsen Orr Law Firm in wishing for our colleague and friend Ryan Carson great joy and professional satisfaction in his new role as a judge.