Former clerk appointed to federal magistrate bench
A familiar face will don a black robe at the federal courthouse in Columbus.
Chelsey V. Vascura, who had worked as a clerk to federal judges at the courthouse for 11 years, has been appointed a U.S. magistrate judge.
Vascura, 39, replaces Terence P. Kemp, who retired this year after 30 years on the bench. She begins work this week.
“She’s a workhorse,” Chief U.S. District Judge Edmund A. Sargus Jr. said of Vascura. He described her as an idea person involved with several judicial committees.
After graduating from the Moritz College of Law at Ohio State University, Vascura spent three years with the law firm of Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease focusing on civil litigation. She then clerked for U.S. District Judge George C. Smith and Chief Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Preston Deavers.
“I hope that I will be fair and listen to all sides,” Vascura said.
She was selected from among five candidates by a vote of the judges of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. The district has main courthouses in Columbus, Cincinnati and Dayton.
Magistrate judges conduct most preliminary and pretrial proceedings in criminal cases, and pretrial matters and evidentiary proceedings in civil matters. They hear misdemeanor criminal cases start to finish, and preside at trials and disposition hearings of civil cases with the consent of the parties.
Vascura, a native of Beverly in Washington County, and her husband, Michael Vascura, live in Columbus with their two children.
Sargus said Ohio’s two senators have begun the process to select a new district judge to replace Gregory L. Frost, who retired last year.