Court Composition
The Court is composed of a Presiding Judge and eight judges (unlike the Texas Supreme Court which is composed of a Chief Justice and eight Justices). Each judge serves a six-year term, and they are elected in staggered partisan elections. Although all nine seats are elected at large, the Presiding Judge seat is separately designated from the other seats.
In order to be a judge, a person must be at least 35 years of age, a United States and Texas citizen, licensed to practice law in Texas, and must have practiced law at least 10 years. A person 75 years or older cannot run for a seat on the Court of Criminal Appeals. A person who becomes 75 during their term of office cannot serve more than four years of their term of office. The Governor of Texas, subject to Senate confirmation, may appoint a judge to serve out the remainder of any unexpired term until the next general election.
Read more about this topic: Texas Court Of Criminal Appeals
Famous quotes containing the words court and/or composition:
“Fortunately for those who pay their court through such foibles, a fond mother, though, in pursuit of praise for her children, the most rapacious of human beings, is likewise the most credulous; her demands are exorbitant; but she will swallow any thing.”
—Jane Austen (1775–1817)
“When I think of God, when I think of him as existent, and when I believe him to be existent, my idea of him neither increases nor diminishes. But as it is certain there is a great difference betwixt the simple conception of the existence of an object, and the belief of it, and as this difference lies not in the parts or composition of the idea which we conceive; it follows, that it must lie in the manner in which we conceive it.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)