Hon. Dean Hansell is a California Superior Court Judge, appointed by Governor Jerry Brown. He was a partner in the global law firm of Hogan Lovells, PLC.

Judge Hansell graduated with a BA cum laude from Denison University and a JD from Northwestern University School of Law. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Omicron Delta Kappa and Phi Delta Theta. He served on Denison’s Board of Trustees and currently serves on the Law Board of Northwestern Law School. Judge Hansell received the Alumni Citation by Denison and the Service Award by Northwestern Law School.

Judge Hansell was appointed by Governor Gavin Newsom to the Governor’s Judicial Selection Advisory Committee. He chairs the California Judge’s Association Compensation & Benefits Committee, served on the Executive Committee and chaired the Community Outreach Committee of the Los Angeles Superior Court.

Hansell was a Police Commissioner of Los Angeles and chaired the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Civilian Oversight Commission Working Group.

He was President of the Los Angele Fire & Police Pension Board and President of Los Angeles’s cable television commission (Board of Information Technology Commissioners.) He currently serves as Vice Chair of the Board of Directors of the Library Foundation of Los Angeles, Governance Committee Chair of the Los Angeles City College Foundation Board and serves on the Board of Governors of Hebrew Union College and the Board of the International Association of LGBT Judges Foundation. He is a Life Fellow of the American Bar Endowment.

Judge Hansell’s prior public service include serving as Co-President of the Los Angeles LGBT Center, Co-Founder and President of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Los Angeles (GLAAD) and President of the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health Dean’s Advisory Board.

Judge Hansell has received various awards including the Distinguished Service Medal from the Board of Police Commissioners of the City of Los Angeles, twice received the Co-President’s Award from the Los Angeles LGBT Bar Association, the Founders Award from GLAAD, the Rabbi Erwin and Agnes Herman Humanitarian Award from Congregation Beth Chayim Chadashim, the Liberty Hill Foundation Humanitarian Award, the Visionary Award from the Stonewall Young Democrats, and the President’s Award from the California Judges Association.

He has authored 45 book chapters and articles and a reference book, The Law of Reinsurance (West Publishing), currently in its 29^th edition. Judge Hansell is a lecturer-in-law at the USC Gould School of Law on insurance law.