Governor Jerry Brown appointed public defender Raimundo J. Montes de Oca as a Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge this week. Sixty-seven-year-old Montes de Oca, who lives in Carpinteria, will fill the empty seat of Judge Frank Ochoa, who retired earlier this year.
Montes de Oca spent his undergraduate years at UCSB and received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of Arizona’s James E. Rogers College of Law. Since 1979, he’s worked in the county’s public defender’s office, serving as public defender for the last four years. Before that, he was a deputy public defender in Pima County, Arizona.
Montes de Oca, whose annual salary will be $189,041, is registered without party preference.