This runoff for a vacant seat on the bench features a longtime public defender running against a veteran alternate public defender. Both boast extensive trial experience.
Donna Tryfman, a deputy public defender, serves in the major cases unit, where she handles homicide and other high-profile defendants. She also has extensive experience in juvenile cases.
David Ross is an alternate in the Torrance branch of the public defenders office and also works in Bellflower and Long Beach. He claims to have represented more than 10,000 clients at hearings and in trials.
The Los Angeles County Bar Assn. rates both attorneys as “qualified” for office. Here’s more of what you need to know about the candidates.
Donna Tryfman, L.A. County deputy public defender
Bar rating: Qualified
Tryfman began with the public defender’s office in 1998, logging more than 100 jury trials. Her experience includes supervising Eastlake Juvenile Court, where she ran a branch with 15 lawyers and represented clients in the collaborative drug court. She is stationed in the major cases unit, focusing on capital homicide litigation.
Tryfman has served as a Superior Court judge pro tem, handling traffic and small claims cases. She has proctored teen courts at Dorsey and Hamilton high schools and last year received the peer-bestowed Gideon felony attorney of the year award.
Conversations on the campaign trail have helped her understand what works and what doesn’t in the justice system.
“It has reinforced for me that experience and knowledge of the law matter enormously, but so does how people are treated when they walk into a courtroom,” she said.
Tryfman said the heavy caseload of a public defender has prepared her for the bench’s rigors. She also cited her life experience as the daughter of immigrants, a single mother and a widow who was faced with the decision of whether to discontinue life support for her husband.
“Experiences like that teach you something about responsibility, compassion and judgment that cannot be learned from a law book,” she said.
Outside the office, Tryfman spent five years as president of the California Public Defenders Assn. and chaired the Rent Stabilization Commission for the city of Beverly Hills. She has served as vice chair of the L.A. County Bar Assn.’s Conference of California Bar Assns., where she helps develop state legislative proposals.
David Ross, L.A. County deputy alternate public defender
Bar rating: Qualified
Ross has more than three decades in the legal field, but it was not his original calling. The Los Angeles native served as a legislative aide to the late U.S. Rep. Floyd Fithian (D-Ind.) on Capitol Hill, then worked as a television journalist and documentary producer in Washington, D.C., Tennessee and Kansas.
“I grew up wanting to be Peter Jennings, not Clarence Darrow,” he told The Times.
Ross passed the bar in 1994, joined the Riverside County public defender’s office the following year and began as a Los Angeles County deputy alternate public defender in 2000. He has litigated 113 jury trials, conducted more than 2,000 preliminary hearings and represented some 10,000 indigent clients. Assigned to the Torrance office since 2018, he also has worked in the Bellflower, Long Beach and Pomona branches, among others.
Ross, who lives in Long Beach, said he has spoken with more than 60 Democratic clubs, unions and other organizations on the campaign trail and frequently has heard a desire for qualified and independent judges who will listen to all sides.
A priority would be ensuring that even if a party loses, they walk out of the courthouse knowing the judge paid attention.
Ross said his mix of legal and life experience and his time as a journalist, in which he “listened to real people, gathered the facts and told objective stories,” provide a unique perspective.