Paige Petersen is expected to be Utah’s new Supreme Court justice after the state Senate voted unanimously to confirm her nomination Wednesday.
The former 3rd District judge was appointed by Gov. Gary Herbert in October. A public comment period opened in early November, and on Monday a committee unanimously approved bringing Petersen’s confirmation to the Senate floor. The unanimous vote took place about 4:15 p.m.
Petersen will fill a vacancy created by Christine Durham’s retirement, which will begin Thursday. Durham was the high court’s first female justice.
Petersen has a lengthy professional history, which includes serving as an assistant U.S. attorney in New York and prosecuting war crimes at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, Netherlands. She started at the U.S. attorney’s office in Utah in 2012.
Petersen grew up in Emery County and graduated from Carbon High School. She attended the University of Utah before graduating from Yale Law School in 1999.
Since appointing Petersen to the high court, Herbert has praised her, saying he chose her because of “great intellectual firepower.”
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