The Gavel Passes; Carmen Dusek Ascends to Retiring Judge Walther's Bench

SAN ANGELO, TX — There will be a quiet tectonic shift in power inside the Tom Green County Courthouse Friday afternoon as longtime 51st District Judge Barbara Walther hands over the 51st District Court gavel to Carmen Dusek who was appointed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott after Walther decided to take senior judge status earlier this fall.   

Walther has been judge of the 51st District of Texas and has presided over the district courts centered in the Tom Green County Courthouse for the better part of three decades.  

Walther presided over many notable cases but is probably best known as the judge who sent Warren Jeffs to prison and saved some 400 children from abuse at the Schleicher County Yearning for Zion Ranch Compound owned by the secretive Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints (FLDS) cult.  

The 51st Judicial District is headquartered in Tom Green County and encompasses Coke, Irion, Sterling and Schleicher counties.

District Judges in Texas are elected to four year terms.  Dusek and the other three District Judges, Brad Goodwin, Ben Woodward and Jay Weatherby will be on the ballot in 2020.

Dusek ran for District Judge in the Republican Primary against Brad Goodwin who went on to win the seat.  Dusek has broad and deep courtroom trial experience. She was an attorney for Jackson Walker, LLP in Austin and San Angelo and worked for the Texas Third Court of Appeals as a Briefing Attorney for Justice Marilyn Aboussie.  Aboussie is a former District Judge from San Angelo.

Dusek's 2016 campaign manager Gus Clemens says she's very capable and will make a good judge.

"Carmen has big shoes to fill and she can fill them.  She's a great mother and wife," he said.

Clemens says his one regret is that Dusek can no longer be his vice president at the San Angelo Performing Arts Coalition.  "I'll make that sacrifice for the greater good."  Clemens said Dusek is a second generation attorney.  She practiced with her father, San Angelo Attorney Clint Symes, until he retired then she joined Jackson Walker, LLP.  

 In a wide ranging interview Thursday as Dusek was driving home from Austin, the newly-appointed District Judge said she was excited, humbled and a bit intimidated to follow in the footsteps of Judge Walther.  Dusek had attended a mandatory new judge training which she said was the largest group of new Texas judges the College for New Judges had seen. Dusek said there were 210 newly elected or appointed judges from every corner of the state.  

Once she is sworn in, Judge Dusek will move into Judge Goodwin’s former office. Dusek says Judge Goodwin has moved into Walther’s former office and will hold court in Courtroom C.  Goodwin was hearing cases in courtroom B on the second floor of the Tom Green County Courthouse. Judge Dusek will hear cases in courtroom B. There are three courtrooms on the second floor of the courthouse; A,B and C.  Courtroom A is the largest courtroom and is used for pretrial and plea hearings, jury selection and cases that have multiple defendants, witnesses and attorneys.

Judge Dusek will preside over her first court case Monday morning Dec. 17 at 9 a.m.