The Alaska Supreme Court will have a new chief justice early next year. Justice Susan Carney will replace outgoing Chief Justice Peter Maassen when he retires in mid-January.
Carney was appointed to the state Supreme Court in 2016 by then-Gov. Bill Walker. She’ll be the longest-serving justice on the bench when Maassen retires.
Carney is a Harvard Law School graduate who clerked for former Alaska Supreme Court Justice Jay Rabinowitz in the late ‘80s. She spent a decade as an assistant public defender in Anchorage, Fairbanks and villages in Interior Alaska. In 1998, Carney moved to the Office of Public Advocacy before being appointed to the Supreme Court. She replaced former Justice Dana Fabe, who in 1996 became the first woman appointed to the Alaska Supreme Court and was later its first female chief justice.
Like all judges in Alaska, Carney was selected by Walker from a shortlist of nominees produced by the nonpartisan Alaska Judicial Council. That’s the independent commission that names potential candidates for the bench under the Alaska Constitution.
Carney will serve a three-year term as chief justice after winning a majority vote of the five-member Alaska Supreme Court. She’ll serve as the administrative head of the Alaska Court System and will likely preside over the first majority-female Alaska Supreme Court, since all three attorneys nominated to replace Maassen are women. Carney will also be the only judge on the bench not appointed by Gov. Mike Dunleavy.
State judges in Alaska face mandatory retirement when they reach age 70. Maassen will retire on January 13, one day short of his 70th birthday.
Eric Stone covers state government, tracking the Alaska Legislature, state policy and its impact on all Alaskans. Reach him at estone@alaskapublic.org and follow him on X at @eriwinsto. Read more about Eric here.
