Yes, I was wearing my judicial robe for the first time.
And I walked down the hallway.
Through the glass walls of the conference room, I could see Trevor in his new suit, looking proud and confident.
The Chief Justice was speaking to him, gesturing around the courthouse.
I opened the door.
“Good morning, Chief Justice.”
“Good morning, Judge Williams.”
Trevor turned around.
His face went completely white.
“Alex,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.
“Judge Martinez,” the Chief Justice corrected gently. “Though I understand you two know each other. Trevor, Judge Martinez was confirmed to the Second Circuit two weeks ago. She’ll be one of the appellate judges reviewing cases from your district court.”
Trevor stared at me and my robe, at the nameplate I brought with me to the conference room.
“You’re… you’re a circuit court judge,” he managed.
“As of last week,” I said calmly. “Please sit down. The Chief Justice and I are here to walk you through how the appellate process works.”
Trevor sat down mechanically, still staring.
The Chief Justice began explaining the relationship between district courts and appellate courts, how cases moved up the chain, what district court judges needed to include in their rulings to make them easier to review on appeal.
Trevor wasn’t listening.
He kept looking at me, then at the Chief Justice, then back at me.
“I’m sorry,” Trevor finally interrupted. “I need to understand. Alex… Judge Martinez is on the Second Circuit. The Court of Appeals.”
“That’s correct,” the Chief Justice said.
“But she’s… she’s 31 years old.”
“Thirty-one and brilliant,” the Chief Justice said firmly. “Her confirmation was one of the smoothest I’ve seen in years. The American Bar Association gave her their highest rating. Her Senate confirmation was 67 to 33, which in this political climate is practically unanimous.”
Trevor looked like he might be sick.
“But she was a public defender—”
“And one of the finest lawyers I’ve encountered in my career,” the Chief Justice said, his tone cooling slightly. “Judge Martinez has argued 15 appellate cases and won 13 of them. She’s exposed prosecutorial misconduct in three separate offices. She’s written extensively on constitutional law. Her legal mind is exceptional.”
Trevor looked like he might be sick.
“The press release went out an hour ago,” I said quietly. “It’s probably hitting the news now.”
Trevor pulled out his phone with shaking hands.
His face somehow went even paler as he scrolled.
“Oh my God,” he whispered. “Oh my God. Emma. Your father.”
“What about them?” the Chief Justice asked, confused.
“They’re my fiancé and her father,” Trevor said faintly. “They… they don’t know.”
“Don’t know what.”
“That Alex… that Judge Martinez is on the Second Circuit.”
The Chief Justice looked at me, then at Trevor, understanding dawning.
“I see,” he said carefully. “Well, they’ll know now.”
“It’s front page of The New York Times legal section,” I said.
At 31, Alexandra Martinez becomes youngest Second Circuit judge in history, breaking barriers as former public defender.
Trevor was scrolling frantically through his phone.
“My phone is exploding,” he said. “Every lawyer I know is texting me. Emma is calling. Your father is calling.”
He looked at me.
“Why didn’t you tell them?”
“They didn’t ask,” I said simply.
“And I was under orders to keep the appointment confidential until the press release went out.”
“But at the party, Emma announced our engagement. I was celebrating my appointment. If we’d known you were—”
He stopped, realizing what he was saying.
“If you’d known I was a circuit court judge, you wouldn’t have excluded me,” I finished for him.
“That’s interesting, Trevor,” I continued. “Because my career didn’t change. My accomplishments didn’t change. The only thing that changed was your perception of their value.”
My phone buzzed on the table.
Then again.
And again.
The Chief Justice glanced at it.
“You should probably turn that off,” he said. “You’re going to be receiving a lot of attention today.”
I silenced my phone, but not before seeing the notifications.
Emma, 37 missed calls.
Dad, 28 missed calls.
Mom, 19 missed calls.
The family group chat, 156 unread messages.
Trevor stood up abruptly.
“I need to… I need to call Emma. Excuse me.”
He practically ran from the conference room.
The Chief Justice looked at me with something like sympathy.
“Family complications?” he asked.
“You could say that.”
“For what it’s worth, Judge Martinez,” he said, “you earned this position entirely on your merit. Whatever your family dynamics, that doesn’t change.”
“Thank you, Chief Justice.”
Now, shall we discuss your first oral arguments?
You have three cases Tuesday, and they’re all significant.
We spent the next hour going through the cases.
By the time we finished, my phone showed 94 missed calls and over 200 text messages.
At 11:00 a.m., Jennifer knocked again.
“Judge Martinez, there are reporters in the lobby. They want an interview about your appointment, and there’s a woman claiming to be your sister demanding to see you.”
“Tell the reporters I’ll issue a statement this afternoon,” I said, “and tell my sister that I’m in a judicial proceeding and cannot be disturbed.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
At noon, I finally checked my messages.
Emma’s text had progressed from confused to angry to panicked.
“Alex, call me now. Why didn’t you tell us? Trevor is humiliated. Everyone at his swearing-in ceremony was talking about you instead of him. Dad is in shock. How could you do this to us? You deliberately let us exclude you from the party knowing you were a circuit court judge. This is so typical of you making everything about yourself.”
My father’s messages were similar.
“Alexandra, we need to talk immediately. I just read The New York Times. Is this real? Do you have any idea how humiliating this is? Everyone at the party was there Saturday. Now they’re all calling asking why we didn’t mention your appointment. People think we didn’t know our own daughter was appointed to the Second Circuit. We look like fools.”
My mother’s messages were the most emotional.
“Alex, please call. Your father is devastated. Emma is crying. This is a disaster. Why didn’t you tell us? We could have celebrated together. Please, sweetheart, we need to fix this.”
The family group chat was pure chaos.
“Aunt Nancy: Did everyone know about Alex except us?”
“Uncle Frank: A circuit court judge. That’s higher than Trevor’s position.”
“Cousin Maria: Wait, I’m confused. I thought Alex was just a public defender.”
“Emma: She was. She deliberately hid this from us.”
“Uncle Frank: Actually, this is incredible. A Second Circuit judge at 31. That’s historic.”
“Emma: That’s not the point.”
“Uncle Frank: I think that’s exactly the point.”
I turned off my phone and went to lunch with two of my new colleagues, senior judges who’d been on the Second Circuit for over a decade.
“We heard about your family situation, Judge Chin,” said kindly. “Courts are small communities. Word travels.”
“It’s complicated,” I said. “It always is.”
“For what it’s worth,” Judge Robertson added, “I’ve read your work. Your appellate briefs from your public defender days are taught at Harvard Law now. You deserve to be here.”
“Thank you.”
“And between us?” Judge Chin leaned in. “Trevor Williams is a fine district court judge, but he’s not Second Circuit material. Not yet. Maybe not ever. You are. Don’t let family politics make you doubt that.”
By Tuesday morning, the story had exploded.
The New York Times ran a feature.
From public defender to federal appellate judge, Alexandra Martinez’s unlikely journey.
The Washington Post published an op-ed.
See more on the next page
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