Munger Tolles Lawyer Nominated to 9th Circuit

(CN) – President Barack Obama nominated Los Angeles attorney Paul J. Watford Monday to fill a vacancy on the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.      A litigation partner in the LA firm Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP, Watford, 44, clerked for 9th Circuit Chief Judge Alex Kozinski in 1994 after graduating from the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law. From 1995 to 1996 he clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.     Watford became a prosecutor in the late 1990s, serving in the U.S.     Attorney’s Office in LA as a member of the major frauds section. He joined Munger, Tolles & Olson in 2001.     “Paul J. Watford has displayed exceptional dedication to the legal profession through his work and I am honored to nominate him to serve the American people as a judge on the United States Court of Appeals,” Obama said in a statement. “He will be a diligent, judicious and esteemed addition to the Ninth Circuit bench.”     If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Watford will fill a seat on the San Francisco-based federal appeals court left empty by the recent death of Judge Pamela Ann Rymer.