Cheryl Johnson

Cheryl A. Johnson (born September 30, 1946) is a judge of the nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the court of last resort for state criminal cases. First elected in 1998, she won new six-year terms in 2004 and 2010.

Background

A native of Illinois, Johnson graduated from Whetstone High School, Columbus, Ohio, in 1964 and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry in 1968 from Ohio State University. She then obtained in 1970 a Master of Science in inorganic crystallography from the University of Illinois at Urbana, Illinois. She worked in the private sector as a computer programmer and chemist until 1980 when she entered law school. In 1983, she received a Juris Doctor from John Marshall Law School in Chicago.^[1]

Legal career

From 1983 to 1984, she clerked for Judge Sam Johnson (no relation) of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. From 1984 until her election to the Court of Criminal Appeals, Johnson practiced law in Austin, Texas. She resides in Dripping Springs, Texas, with her husband, Gregory William Lasley (born 1949), a retired lieutenant with the Austin Police Department.^[1]

In 1996, Johnson ran unsuccessfully in a Republican runoff election for the Court of Criminal Appeals. Tom Price of Dallas won the nomination, 128,363 votes (57.2 percent) to Johnson's 95,941 (42.8 percent).^[2] Price then unseated the Democrat Frank Maloney to win the appeals court seat in the general election.^[3]

Two years later, however, Johnson narrowly won the Republican nomination for the Court of Criminal Appeals, then for the Place 2 position. In a runoff election held on April 14, 1998, she defeated intra-party challenger Harvey Hudson, 104,773 (51 percent) to 100,818 (49 percent).^[4] In the general election, she received 2,103,959 votes (57.8 percent) to 1,471,200 (42.2 percent) for the Democrat candidate, Winston Cochran.^[5] She succeeded the Democrat African-American judge, Morris Overstreet, who ran instead, unsuccessfully, for his party's nomination for state attorney general against Jim Mattox,^[6] who then lost the general election to Republican John Cornyn, now Texas's senior U.S. Senator.

In 2004 and 2010, Johnson was reelected with 85.8 and 82.9 percent of the vote, respectively.^[7][8] Judge Johnson's current term for Place 5 expires on December 31, 2016. She is not seeking re-election.^[9]

References

Current statewide political officials of Texas
U.S. Senators	John Cornyn Ted Cruz
State government	Greg Abbott, Governor Dan Patrick, Lieutenant Governor & President of the Senate Carlos Cascos, Secretary of State (appointed) Ken Paxton, Attorney General Glenn Hegar, Comptroller (Treasurer equivalent) George P. Bush, Land Commissioner Sid Miller, Agriculture Commissioner Christi Craddick, Ryan Sitton, David J. Porter, Railroad Commissioners
Senate	Juan Hinojosa, President pro tempore In the Texas Senate, there are no majority or minority leaders.
House	Joe Straus, Speaker Dennis Bonnen, Speaker pro tempore In the Texas House, there are no majority or minority leaders.
Supreme Court (civil)	Nathan Hecht, Chief Justice Don Willett Debra Lehrmann John P. Devine Paul W. Green Jeff Brown Jeffrey S. Boyd Phil Johnson Eva Guzman
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals	Sharon Keller, Presiding Justice Lawrence E. Meyers Bert Richardson Kevin Patrick Yeary Cheryl Johnson Michael Keasler Barbara Hervey Elsa Alcala David Newell