MACK FOR JUDGE

My first jury trial was a shambles.  The courtroom was August hot.  Courthouse air conditioning faltered, so windows were thrown open.  Trucks roared past on Fourth Avenue, intermittently drowning the proceedings.  Insulating obesity conspired with nervousness to drench me in perspiration.  Perversely, the district court judge kept counsels clad in wool suit jackets.  I mopped myself with a washcloth.  One cuff of my slacks unhinged.  I kept tripping on the loose hem.  My trial notebook, neatly organized, cascaded from the prosecutor’s table, splattered across the dusty floor.  A juror sighed.  Panic gripped me.

A small hand found a place on my shoulder.  I turned to Barbara Mack, my supervisor at the King County Prosecutor’s Office, a big person in a small lady’s body.  “Take a deep breath, Brad.”  I had not noticed I was not breathing.  “You are doing fine,” she optimized.  I doubted her, but calmed myself and returned to my duties.  Instead of lunch, I loitered in my skivvies while the local tailor repaired my “costume malfunction.”  That afternoon, the jury deliberated, then convicted.  A domestic abuser got well-deserved censure.  Barbara sat through the entire sweatfest.  I survived.

Throughout that year, I worked as a rule nine intern for the fraud division.  Barbara Mack mentored me, soothed my litigation woes, and strategized my nits and inanities.  I discovered a remarkable, patient human being.

In November, you will find Barbara Mack on your ballot, a candidate for King County Superior Court Judge, Position 37. Barbara is thoughtful, tough, compassionate, experienced, deserving.  Please vote for her.

Nationally, Barbara Mack has co-founded The Environmental Policy Center, testified before Congress, organized grassroots environmental coalitions, worked in the bowels of the Carter Administration (Interior Department), and taught at Harvard.  Locally, Barbara Mack has prosecuted felonies and complex financial fraud for more than twenty years, argued before the Court of Appeals and Washington Supreme Court, taught lawyers law, taught police officers courtroom skills, and served on boards of charitable foundations.  Personally, Barbara Mack has a life, parenting her son, watching the Mariners struggle, and enjoying hikes, racquetball, her garden, and music.

Often, come ballot time, people cannot recall who they wanted for judge.   Let me help you with that.   Barbara Mack.  Like Mack Trucks.   Like Mack n’ cheese.   Like Mack-aroons.   Mack-num opus.   Mack-nanimous.   Mack-nificent.   Elect Barbara Mack a Superior Court Judge.   We will all be glad you did.
Join me: Mack for Judge.