Candidate for
Superior Court Judge; County of San Diego; Office 19

For the past 17 years, Paul Cooper has dedicated his legal career to public service as a prosecutor, Police Legal Advisor and as Counsel to the Chief of Police, William Lansdowne, fighting to keep our families and neighborhoods safe.

Paul is a fourth generation San Diegan, graduating from Patrick Henry High School. Paul received a Master's Degree in Public Administration from the University of Southern California. He graduated with honors from the J. Reuben Clark Law School at BYU in 1991, and then completed a two-year clerkship at the United District Court for the District of Utah, developing one of the first integrated alternative dispute resolution programs in the federal court system.

After completing his clerkship at the federal court, he was hired in 1993 by the San Diego City Attorney's Office as a Deputy City Attorney prosecutor in its criminal division. After prosecuting hundreds of DUI's, theft and other quality of life crimes, he was promoted to the City Attorney's newly formed Domestic Violence and Child Abuse Unit headed by Casey Gwinn. Soon thereafter Paul was promoted to Head Deputy City Attorney in charge of the Domestic Violence Unit, recognized in 1993 by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges as the model domestic violence prosecution unit in the nation.

In 1996, Paul moved into the Office's civil division and began working as a Police Legal Advisor (PLA) to the San Diego Police Department under then Chief of Police Jerry Sanders. As a Police Advisor, he had the opportunity to work directly with front line police officers helping make San Diego one on the safest large cities in the nation.

In 2002, Paul appeared before the California Supreme Court and successfully argued a case, now published, that protects the confidentiality of police officer personnel files.

Paul worked on special legal projects such as: Megan's Law, the San Diego Parenting Project, the Neighborhood Prosecutors Program and participated on the Use of Force Taskforce whose recommendations are currently used by law enforcement today.

In 2000, under Chief of Police David Bejarano, Paul was promoted to Senior Police Legal Advisor supervising the police legal advisors unit.

In 2003, Paul was asked by Chief of Police William Lansdowne to act as his legal counsel and policy advisor. As Counsel to Chief Lansdowne, he has the opportunity to be involved and advise on every aspect of the San Diego Police Department including homicide investigations, officer involved shootings, search warrant issues, gang and narcotic issues and borders crime issues, to name just a few. During Chief Lansdowne's tenure, the department has focused on combating violent crime in San Diego and have been successful in making San Diego one of the safest large cities in America.

Paul is married and has three children (Maddy 13, Tess 11, and Sam 9) and is active in his community participating and coaching Youth Soccer and Little League.