24 January 2008

ST. LOUIS – The Twenty-Second Circuit Judicial Commission announced the panel of three nominees to be submitted to Governor Blunt to fill the circuit judge vacancy in St. Louis created by the retirement of Judge Joan M. Burger.

Those nominated by the Commission are Commissioner Anne-Marie Clarke, Bryan L. Hettenbach and the Honorable Michael K. Mullen.

Clarke is a native of the city of St. Louis. She is a graduate of Rosati-Kain High School. She received a bachelor of arts degree from Northwest Missouri State College (now University) in Maryville in 1970. She received her law degree from Saint Louis University School of Law in 1973. She has served as Family Court Commissioner for the 22nd Judicial Circuit Court since October 1998. She was a hearing officer at the city's juvenile division from January 1986 until her appointment as commissioner. She resides in St. Louis with her husband.

Hettenbach has been a lawyer in private practice in St. Louis for 20 years. He currently handles trials and appeals primarily in family and juvenile law cases. After graduation from law school at the University of Missouri-Columbia, he worked as a staff attorney at the Supreme Court of Missouri. He is a frequent speaker and author for continuing legal education programs, he has served as an adjunct professor of legal studies and he is a former news editor of Missouri Lawyers Weekly, a legal publication distributed statewide. He is a member of the Lawyers Association of St. Louis and the Metropolitan Bar Association of St. Louis.

Mullen was appointed as an associate circuit judge in May 2001. Before being appointed to the bench, he was engaged in the private practice of law as a sole practitioner and as a partner in the law firm of Mullen and Fernandez. He was an assistant circuit attorney from 1990 to 1995. He has clerked at the Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District, and has been an adjunct professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. He is married to Joan Heilweck Mullen and they have four children.

The commission believes these candidates chosen from a field of extremely qualified individuals possess those qualities of compassion, intellect and high moral purpose essential to the fair and efficient administration of justice. Each of these people have that trial experience and sense of fairness that the commission knows is required to administer justice to the people of the city of St. Louis and the State of Missouri and proudly presents these names to Governor Blunt for his ultimate decision. The commission is confident that all of these individuals are capable of serving well and honorably if selected by the governor.

The members of the Twenty-Second Circuit Judicial Commission are: Chief Judge of the Missouri Court of Appeals Eastern District Patricia L. Cohen, June Bosley Dabney-Gray, Stephen Doss, Thomas Schwartz and Mary Anne Sedey.

Contact: Laura Roy, clerk

Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District

(314) 539-4300