Special Collections: Chief Judge Mary Ellen Barbera Bobblehead

Chief Judge*, Court of Appeals, July 8, 2013 to September 10, 2021. Barbera, a graduate of the University of Maryland School of Law, is the first female Chief Judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals. 

Prior to her appointment to the Court of Appeals, she served as an at large judge on Maryland's intermediate appellate court, the Court of Special Appeals, from January 4, 2002 to September 2, 2008. On July 3, 2013, Governor Martin O'Malley appointed Judge Barbera as successor to former Chief Judge Robert M. Bell, who reached the mandatory retirement age of 70. On September 3, 2021, Governor Larry Hogan appointed Judge Joseph M. Getty to succeed Barbera when she reached the mandatory retirement age on September 10, 2021.

*In the 2022 general election held on November 8, 2022, voters approved a constitutional amendment to change the name of the court to the "Supreme Court of Maryland", and the title of its judges to "Justice."

Supreme Court bobbleheads are produced by The Green Bag, a quarterly law journal first published from 1889-1914 and revived in 1997. [The Green Bag was likely named after the green bag that many nineteenth-century legal professionals used to carry their papers.]