Two attorneys are running for an open judge position in Division 7 of the Wyandotte County District Court.
They are Vicki Meyer and Courtney Mikesic, both Democrats. They appeared at a candidate forum on July 12 at Kansas City Kansas Community College. It was sponsored by Business West, neighborhood business organizations and KCKCC.
The primary election is Tuesday, Aug. 2.
Meyer worked from 1990 to 2009 in the Wyandotte County District attorney’s office. She became the head of the juvenile division, where she supervised five attorneys. Then she moved to the city where she prosecuted domestic violence cases.
“My job as a prosecutor is to hold people accountable for their decisions, their criminal actions,” she said. “My passion as a prosecutor, is once we get that accountability, that we make sure they become productive, by putting them in programs, by getting them help, by not necessarily always putting them in jail.”
She said most of those who she has dealt with are good people who are just making very bad decisions, and her goal is to make sure they get help so they don’t come back through the system.
Meyer was a teacher in the Kansas City, Kan., Public Schools, and served on the school board for 18 years. After teaching 10 years at elementary schools, she went to law school, then started working in the district attorney’s office in 1989. She said she did a lot of civil lawsuits while an intern and also when she was in the juvenile division of the district attorney’s office.
She has done hundreds of bench trials, jury trials and has made arguments to the appellate court. “I believe my experience over those 25.5 years leaves me qualified to be the next district court judge of Division 7,” she said.
Meyer also has served on the Alcohol Advisory Board and the State of Kansas Domestic Violence Facility Review Board.
Mikesic is a fourth-generation Wyandotte County resident, and graduated from Bishop Ward High School, Kansas City Kansas Community College, and went to Long Island University, where she graduated magna cum laude. She played volleyball there, also. She went to Washburn Law School, and worked at the law clinic there to help represent the indigent. She was a law clerk at the Kansas Supreme Court, and then worked as an intern at the Wyandotte County District Attorney’s office.
For the past 10 years she has been a civil litigation attorney, and is now the managing attorney of a civil litigation law firm. She manages a staff of attorneys and support staff. She also has served as a part-time judge pro tem in Wyandotte County, and has experience handling cases and trials.
She also has done a lot of pro bono work in the past 10 years in criminal and civil cases.
Mikesic has been endorsed by the Tri-County Labor Council, International Association of Firefighters and the Greater Kansas City Women’s Political Caucus.
In the area of civil litigation, Meyer said she had experience through her legal aid work with divorces, landlord-tenant cases and through the juvenile division, with child in need of care cases.
Through her work, Mikesic has experience with medical malpractice, breach of contract work, mechanics’ liens, contract work, collection work, from large companies to smaller cases involving individuals. She has handled more than 1,000 civil cases.
In the area of criminal litigation, while at the district attorney’s office Mikesic had experience with adult criminal cases, DUI trials, and traffic cases. With her pro bono work for those who can’t afford legal representation, she does child in need of care cases, juvenile cases, battered women cases, family cases, and occasionally she represents her civil clients if they are involved in a criminal case.
Meyer said for over 25 years, she has done everything from the lowest disorderly conduct case to homicide, and everything in between. Now she does primarily domestic violence cases and works with victims.
To better educate the public about the judicial process, Meyer said she had gone to classrooms in Wyandotte County to speak to students about it.
Mikesic said she is in several organizations in the community, and she gives presentations about court processes, such as what to expect when they have to go to court.
Meyer said learning how to listen to people is important. “In order to be a good judge, you have to be able to listen,” Meyer said. “You have to be able to then determine how to be fair and honest with those people.”
Also, a judge needs to be able to tell a defendant honestly what the situation is, what will happen and this is how to get there.
Mikesic said she has gone to her dad, retired Judge David Mikesic, for advice on what she needs to do to be a judge. “He’s told me, ‘Courtney, when you’re on the bench, you’re going to have good days, some of the best days of your life when you bring people together, where you help people out. You’re going to build families, you’re going to make marriages, you’re going to do adoptions. You’re going to have the worst days. You’re going to tear families apart, you’re going to have to make the worst decisions.’ But he said ‘as long as you follow the Golden Rule, you will do all right.’”
“’Everyone who comes in that courtroom, treat fairly and with respect. Treat how you would want to be treated. That is the Golden Rule.’ So I can promise you, as your next judge, everyone who comes into my courtroom, I will treat fairly and with respect.”
To view the candidate forum online, visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSwLeoNrdkU&index=8&list=PLMfeRPiOepX3iQS-Y5OCca80njs3sop8W.
The forum is being shown on KCKCC’s cable television station. To see a schedule, visit https://wyandotteonline.com/candidate-forum-to-be-shown-on-kckcc-cable-channel-2/.
For more information about Meyer, visit https://www.facebook.com/vickimeyerforjudge/.
For more information about Mikesic, visit http://www.votemikesicjudge.com/.