Dissent in Democracy
The Honorable Halim Dhanidina is a Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge, currently assigned to hear criminal cases in the Long Beach Superior Court. Prior to his current position, Dhanidina was a Deputy District Attorney for Los Angeles County for 14 years, prosecuting cases for the elite Hardcore Gang and Major Crimes Divisions before serving in the District Attorney's Special Operations Administration. As an attorney, Dhanidina served as a board member for the Asian Pacific American and South Asian Bar Associations where he developed and implemented various programs designed to provide services to traditionally underserved communities. He is currently an adjunct professor of law at Whittier Law School and Western State School of Law where he teaches Criminal and Civil Trial Advocacy, Criminal Procedure, and Legal Ethics, and he previously taught Criminal Law at the Glendale University College of Law. He is a member of the board of the interfaith organization, Muslim-Jewish NewGround, sponsored by the Los Angeles City Commission on Human Relations, and he sits on the Advisory Board of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association, as well as the Orange County Advisory Council of Asian Americans Advancing Justice. He is a volunteer judge for the Los Angeles Superior Court’s Teen Court program, and he is the judicial branch’s representative on the California Supreme Court Chief Justice’s Power of Democracy program created to promote civic learning in public schools.
Dhanidina earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in International Relations from Pomona College in 1994, where he received the Senior Service Award, and a Juris Doctorate from the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law in 1997, which named him the Asian Pacific Islander Law Students Association Alumnus of the Year in 2013. He has been recognized for his service to the community as a recipient of the Muslim Public Affairs Council Foundation’s Community Leadership Award in 2013 and the Muslim Legal Fund of America’s Trailblazer in Justice Award in 2014, as well as the South Asian Bar Association Foundation’s 2016 Trailblazer Award. As a Deputy District Attorney, he was recognized for his work on behalf of crime victims by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, and was a recipient of the South Asian Network’s Public Service Award.
Dhanidina has been a featured guest speaker for various organizations including SABA-NC, NAPABA, Greenberg, Traurig LLP., the Los Angeles City Human Relations Commission, the Muslim Bar Association of Southern California, the Long Beach Bar Association, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the University of Southern California, and he gave the Baccalaureate Address for the 2013 commencement ceremonies at the Claremont Colleges.
Judge Dhanidina's Athenaeum talk is made possible in collaboration with the Claremont Journal of Law and Public Policy.
View Video: YouTube with Halim Dhandidina