Woman is chief judge in Western District
A jurist in Del Rio with the biggest criminal caseload in the country is now the first woman to become chief judge of the federal Western District of Texas.
Chief U.S. District Judge Alia Moses assumed the leadership position Nov. 18, taking the reins from U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia of San Antonio, who finished his seven-year term in that post.
The Western District of Texas — which includes a large segment of the U.s.mexico border and 68 counties — has one of the coun
try’s busiest criminal dockets. Moses alone presides over an average of 1,000 cases a year, most of them criminal.
“There’s only one district judge in Del Rio, but she has the biggest criminal caseload per judge in the country,” Garcia said. “Her docket’s huge.”
The criminal cases Moses handles include public corruption, drug trafficking and the harboring and transportation of undocumented immigrants. She is also overseeing civil lawsuits stemming from the May 24 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.
In addition to the heavy caseload, Moses will now oversee budgetary and administrative matters, including case assignments, grievance issues and divisions of the court that include the clerk’s office and pretrial services officers.
She will continue to work out of Del Rio.
The sprawling district is one of the largest in the country and stretches from Waco to the north, El Paso to the west and Del Rio and Eagle Pass to the south. The district also includes San Antonio, Pecos, Alpine and Midland/odessa.
The Western District of Texas has 12 district judges, who preside over trials; five senior judges, who are semi-retired; and 16 magistrate judges, who largely handle pretrial matters for district judges. Moses and U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone of El Paso are the only women on the district benches. Of the remaining jurists, four of the 16 magistrate judges are women, Garcia said.
“It’s a little surreal,” Moses said. “I didn’t get on the bench to be the first of anything.”
She was born in Quemado, a small town about 18 miles northwest of Eagle Pass. Her father was a farmer, and her mother raised their six children. Moses is the youngest.
She grew up in Eagle Pass but attended primary school in Quemado, where the highest class level is sixth grade. She then went to Eagle Pass for middle and high schools.
Moses graduated from Texas Woman’s University in North Texas with a bachelor’s degree in 1983 and from the University of Texas at Austin School of Law with a juris doctor in 1986.
“Honestly, I don’t know why I picked being a lawyer. My undergraduate was in accounting,” she said. “One day, I just said, ‘I’m going to go to law school.’”
Out of law school, she became an assistant district attorney in Travis County, where she handled prosecutions and appellate cases.
She then went on to become a federal prosecutor in Del Rio and was later promoted to chief of that arm of the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
In 1997, she was selected by the judiciary to be a federal magistrate in Del Rio, handling pretrial matters in criminal and civil cases.
In 2002, she became the first woman named to the federal bench in the district. She was appointed by then-president George W. Bush to a judgeship vacated by Harry Hudspeth, who took senior status and later retired. She also became the first permanent district judge in Del Rio, which had relied on visiting judges from San Antonio and elsewhere to preside over trial cases.
A celebration
A day after being named chief judge, she was joined by about 30 former or current law clerks and other staffers in Southlake in North Texas to celebrate her 20 years of service in the judiciary. Lawyers from all corners of the country attended the event to honor Moses, Texas Woman’s University said in a story on its website.
Moses said she’s still getting a handle on being chief judge, but the administrative part of her job is already taking up part of her attention.
Last week, U.S. District Judge Frank Montalvo in El Paso took senior status, which effectively means he’s semi-retired. Another El Paso jurist, U.S. District Judge David C. Guaderrama, notified the district that he, too, will take senior status in June. That means Moses likely will help make case assignments there and will work with lawyer committees that choose replacements for Montalvo and Guaderrama.
In the meantime, she could get some help in Del Rio in the coming year. As chief judge, Judge Garcia helped oversee a vote that moved a judgeship from El Paso to Del Rio. The search to fill the seat is ongoing.
Moses, meanwhile, is grateful for the foundation Garcia laid for her.
“One of my mentors and friends I’ll have a tough time following is Judge Garcia,” Moses said. “I hope to do at least half the work he did half as well.”