Gov. Baker Nominates Rachel Hershfang as Associate Justice of the Appeals Court

Recently, Gov. Charlie Baker announced the nomination of South End native Rachel Hershfang as Associate Justice of the Appeals Court.
“The decades of experience in public service that Rachel Hershfang…will bring to the respective courts and the people of the Commonwealth make them well-qualified candidates,” said Governor Charlie Baker. “I look forward to the Governor’s Council’s consideration of their nominations for these appointments.”
Rachel Hershfang is a product of the South End, and is a native to the neighborhood. She is the daughter of long-time former South End residents Herb and Ann Hershfang.
Attorney Rachel Hershfang has been a senior trial attorney at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) since 2008. She advises investigations of securities law violations including fraud, technical and accounting violations, and manages cases as they move through the civil litigation process. Before the SEC, Hershfang was an Assistant United States Attorney at the United States Attorney’s Office from 2000 to 2008, where she specialized in prosecuting cases involving drugs and money laundering. From 2005 through 2008, she was also the Deputy Chief of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, supervising its work throughout Boston and New England. Prior to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Hershfang served as a Litigation Associate with Ropes & Gray from 1996 to 2000, working cases involving contract breaches, trademark infringements and Telecommunications Act disputes. In 1999, during her time at Ropes & Gray, she became a Special Assistant District Attorney to the Middlesex District Attorney’s Office, where she tried cases, negotiated plea bargains and handled arraignments, bail arguments and motions to suppress. A 1989 graduate of Northwestern University with a Bachelor’s Degree in English, Hershfang later earned a Master’s Degree in English from the University of Chicago in 1992, then her Juris Doctorate from Yale Law School in 1995. A member of the Boston Bar Association since 2011, she became a member of the BBA Council in 2017 and now sits on its Executive Committee. She previously sat on two BBA steering committees, and served on the Boston Bar Journal’s Board of Editors from 2011 to 2017.
The Massachusetts Appeals Court is a court of general appellate jurisdiction. The justices review decisions that trial judges from the several Departments of the Trial Court have already made in many different kinds of cases. The Appeals Court also has jurisdiction over appeals from final decisions of three State agencies: the Appellate Tax Board, the Industrial Accident Board and the Commonwealth Employment Relations Board. The Appeals Court has twenty-five statutory justices, including the chief justice.

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