Dennis Cota '86 becomes magistrate judge for Eastern District

Dennis Cota ’86, a King Hall alumnus and longtime trial practice instructor and coach, has become a magistrate judge for the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California.

Appointed to the Eastern District’s Redding courtroom, Cota took the bench for the first time in September. He has left the Roseville law firm he co-founded, Cota, Cole & Huber LLP, which continues as Cole Huber LLP.

His transition to the bench was “really a matter of wanting to serve,” Cota said. “I had the benefits of a little over 30 years of practice, and had my own firm for 10 years.” During his career, Cota, 60, also has been a managing partner at a large firm (Best Best & Krieger), and argued complex litigation before the Ninth Circuit and other federal courts.

“I really felt like I had fulfilled many of the goals I had established when I was at King Hall in the early ’80s,” Cota said. “It was time for me to serve in a different capacity, to give back to a profession that had been so generous to me.”

He had not expected to be appointed on his first attempt to gain a judgeship, Cota said, but he was. Now he and his wife, Becky, are in the process of relocating to Redding.

He is still teaching and coaching trial practice at UC Davis School of Law, and would like to continue for as long as he is able. But doing so is subject to court approval, and he only has it for a year so far.

He became a trial practice adjunct professor in 2004, not long after moving back to the Sacramento region from Southern California. At first, he handled labs for Professor Ed Imwinkelried, his own former trial practice teacher. When Imwinkelried retired, Cota began teaching classes as well.

Cota has expanded the trial practice program’s competitive aspect. He started a 1L event, dubbed the “Cota Competition” by his students, that just completed its fourth year, with nearly a third of the first-year class participating.

This past weekend, the program hosted its inaugural Martin Luther King, Jr. Civil Rights Trial Competition in Sacramento. The event attracted 16 schools, including UCLA and No. 1-ranked Florida Stetson.