PRESIDENT JUDGE RENÉE COHN JUBELIRER
Judge Renée Cohn Jubelirer was elected in November 2001 to a ten-year term on the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, beginning in January, 2002 and was retained for another ten year term in 2011, and in 2021.. She is a 1978 graduate of the Pennsylvania State University, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts in English, with distinction. She attended the Northwestern University School of Law, where she served as Executive Editor of the Law Review. She was awarded her juris doctor with cum laude honors in 1983. That same year, she was inducted into the Order of the Coif. Following graduation, Judge Cohn Jubelirer served as a teaching fellow in legal research and writing at Stanford Law School. She then served as an Assistant Professor at De Paul University College of Law, where she taught Torts and Remedies. Her career includes additional public service as a deputy and assistant solicitor for Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, and an arbitrator for the Court of Common Pleas of Lehigh County. In private practice, she worked as an associate at Sidley & Austin in Chicago, Illinois, and later as Vice President and Shareholder in Frank, Frank, Penn & Bergstein in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Before assuming her seat on the bench, she was Senior in-house Counsel for a telecommunications company. She was also elected to the Board of Commissioners of South Whitehall Township.
Judge Cohn Jubelirer has been admitted to the Bar of Pennsylvania, the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of PA, and United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. She is a member of the Lehigh County, Pennsylvania and the American Bar Associations, as well as the Donald E. Wieand, Sr. American Inn of Court, the James S. Bowman American Inn of Court, and the National Association of Women Judges.
Judge Cohn Jubelirer formerly chaired the Pennsylvania Appellate Court Procedural Rules Committee and the Judicial Education Sub Committee of the Judicial Council of Pennsylvania.
Judge Cohn Jubelirer is a member of several committees of the Pennsylvania Bar Association, including the Workers’ Compensation Liaison Committee, the Appellate Advocacy Committee, the Judicial Administration Committee and the Women in the Profession Committee. She is also a member of the Workers’ Compensation Section of the PBA. She has participated as a panel member in several CLE courses of the Pennsylvania Bar Institute.
Her home chambers are located in State College. She is married to Robert Jubelirer, and is the mother of three sons.
JUDGE PATRICIA A. MCCULLOUGH
Judge McCullough was elected to the Commonwealth Court in 2009 and retained in 2019.
She is a native of Pittsburgh and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh (magna cum laude) in 1978 and from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law in 1981 having spent the summer of 1980 in a legal program at the University of Strasbourg in Strasbourg, France. After graduation from law school, she was a law clerk for Judge Samuel Rodgers of the Common Pleas Court of Washington County
From 1983 to 1991, Judge McCullough was Assistant General Counsel for the University of Pittsburgh and served on the adjunct faculty at the University of Pittsburgh. From 1991 to 2004, she was in private practice and served for five years as a member (and later chair) of the Allegheny County Board of Property Assessment Appeals and Review. In 2005 she was appointed a judge of the Common Pleas Court of Allegheny County.
Judge McCullough has been active in her church and in 2006 and 2007 she was Executive Director of the Catholic Charities for the Diocese of Pittsburgh. She returned to private practice in 2008 and 2009 before successfully running for the Commonwealth Court.
JUDGE ANNE E. COVEY
Judge Anne E. Covey was elected in November 2011 to a ten-year term on the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, beginning January, 2012. She was retained for a ten-year term in 2021. Prior to her election, Judge Covey served as the first woman Member appointed to the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board in 2002 by Governor Mark Schweiker and then reappointed in 2005 by Governor Ed Rendell. In addition, she practiced Labor and Employment Law with Covey & Associates, P.C. which she founded in 1996 and owned. While in private practice she was considered a national expert on Labor and Employment Law. She also worked for several law firms, including, Blank Rome, McCarter & English, and Giordano, Halleran & Ciesla. Judge Covey served a Commonwealth Court clerkship under President Judge David W. Craig and was a staff attorney to the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board.
Judge Covey is a 1981 graduate of the University of Delaware, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors. She attended Widener University School of Law where she was the Law Review Associate Editor of The Delaware Journal of Corporate Law, Case Note Author of The Delaware Law Forum, and a member of Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society and Phi Delta Phi Legal Honor Fraternity. She was awarded her Juris Doctorate, with cum laude honors, in 1984 and received the American Jurisprudence Award
Judge Covey has written extensively, including authoring the book, The Workplace Law Advisor and a chapter in the best-selling book Business: The Ultimate Resource and The Compensation Guide. She has developed and taught courses for professional associations and Monmouth University. She has been interviewed as an expert by UPI, WNYC, and WFAN and many other news outlets. In celebration of the Commonwealth Court’s fortieth anniversary in 2010, Judge Covey co-authored Contribution of the Commonwealth Court to Public Employee Labor Law: The First Forty Years for publication in the Widener University School of Law Journal.
Judge Covey is a member of the Bucks County, Pennsylvania and American Bar Associations. She is admitted to practice before the Bars of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. She served as a Barrister in the Employment Law American Inn of Court.
Judge Covey’s home chambers are located in Bucks County. She is married to attorney Michael S. Morris, and they have a son and daughter.
JUDGE MICHAEL H. WOJCIK
Judge Wojcik was elected to Commonwealth Court on November 3, 2015, and was commissioned and took the oath of office on January 4, 2016. Prior to his election, Judge Wojcik was engaged in the private practice of law for over 26 years with several law firms, including Kirkpatrick & Lockhart; Weinberg & Stein; LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae; and Thorp Reed & Armstrong. He also served as Solicitor to the Allegheny County Controller, as Allegheny County Solicitor, and as Solicitor to the Allegheny County Airport Authority. In the course of his private and public practice, Judge Wojcik gained experience in myriad areas of the law, including municipal law, tax and assessment law, election law, civil rights, and personal injury, to name a few, and managed the second largest municipal law department in the Commonwealth.
Judge Wojcik earned a Bachelor of Arts degree at Juniata College, in Huntingdon, Huntingdon County, and a Juris Doctor degree, cum laude, at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, where he was a member of the University of Pittsburgh Law Review, serving as Symposium Editor for volume 50.
A native of the Borough of Central City, Somerset County, Judge Wojcik earned the rank of Eagle Scout and remains active in the Boy Scouts of America, serving as an Assistant Scoutmaster and Committee Chair of Troop 646, located at St. Bede Church in the Point Breeze neighborhood of Pittsburgh. He also is Chair of the Lackawanna District of the Laurel Highlands Council, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Laurel Highlands Council. He has served as a youth basketball coach, as general manager of the East End Boys Lacrosse Club and as Vice President of the parents’ committee of the Oakland Catholic Rowing Club.
Judge Wojcik’s home chambers are in Pittsburgh. He resides in Fox Chapel, Allegheny County, with his wife, Traci L. (Yonko) Wojcik, MD, an obstetrician/gynecologist, their daughter and son, and Allegheny County’s most lovable and disloyal golden retriever.
JUDGE CHRISTINE FIZZANO-CANNON
Judge Fizzano Cannon was elected to a ten-year term on the Commonwealth Court
of Pennsylvania in November 2017, for which she was rated “highly
recommended” by the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Judicial Evaluation
Commission. She previously served as a county Court of Common Pleas trial
court judge from 2012-2017, where she was the head of the civil trial section.
Prior to becoming a judge, Judge Fizzano Cannon was in private practice for 17
years and was a municipal solicitor for various governmental entities.
Judge Fizzano Cannon’s public service includes her tenure as a County
Commissioner from 2008 to 2011, where she was elected Vice Chairman in
January 2010. She served from 1999 to 2007 on her township’s board of
commissioners, and previously served on her local Zoning Hearing Board.
Judge Fizzano Cannon has worked to promote ethics in the profession as a member
of the Pennsylvania Judicial Conduct Board, the Governor’s Judicial Advisory
Committee and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court Disciplinary Board Hearing
Committee.
Judge Fizzano Cannon is an inaugural member at the Master level on the Drexel
University Kline School of Law American Inn of Court. She served two two-year
terms on the Board of Directors of her county bar association and is also a
member of the Pennsylvania and American Bar Associations. Among her many
civic and charitable endeavors, Judge Fizzano Cannon has served on the boards of
directors of a local hospital, a healthcare foundation, a regional finance authority,
an arboretum, and a women’s commission.
Judge Fizzano Cannon is a graduate of the University of Arizona and Delaware
Law School, where she graduated with honors and served as the Articles Editor of
the Law Review.
JUDGE ELLEN CEISLER
Judge Ellen Ceisler was elected in November 2017 to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, beginning January 2018.
Immediately prior, Judge Ceisler completed a 10-year term as an elected Judge of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. Through her term she handled a wide variety of cases, including those within the Major Civil Trial and Criminal Divisions, and Civil Motions Court where she presided over governmental agency issues with both original and appellate jurisdiction.
Judge Ceisler received her B.A. from Temple University (1979) and her Juris Doctorate from Temple University in 1986. Since her admission to the Bar in 1986, Judge Ceisler has had a varied career including serving as a Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney, an Investigative Producer for CBS News, a litigator in private practice, Special Advisor to the Philadelphia Sheriff’s Office, Director of the Philadelphia Police Department’s Integrity and Accountability Office, Consultant to the Philadelphia School District on issues pertaining to school safety and discipline, and Director of the Special Investigations Unit for the Philadelphia City Controller’s Office.
Judge Ceisler has been active in the following organizations: The Anti Defamation League (Executive Board Member), Support Center For Child Advocates (Board Member), Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, New Leash on Life USA (Board Member), Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia, and the First Judicial District Committee on the Board of Revision of Taxes and Board of View (Co-chair).
Judge Ceisler’s home chambers are located in Philadelphia.
JUDGE LORI A. DUMAS
Judge Lori A. Dumas became the 40th commissioned judge of the Commonwealth Court after her election in November 2021. She graduated from Duke University in 1989 and from North Carolina Central University School of Law in 1992 where she was a contributing editor on the Law Review. She was in private practice from 1993 to 2000 and vice-president/general counsel of Wordsworth Academy from 2000 to 2002. A judge of the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas (in the Family, Criminal and Civil Law Divisions) from 2002 to 2021, she also was an adjunct professor at Temple University, West Chester University and Peirce College from 2007 to 2011.
Judge Dumas is a member of the American Bar, the National Bar, the Pennsylvania Bar, and the Philadelphia Bar Associations. She has been active in the Pennsylvania Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, the International Association of Juvenile and the Family Court Judges, and the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Court Judges.
JUDGE STACY WALLACE
Judge Stacy Wallace became the 41st commissioned judge of the Commonwealth Court after her election in November 2021. She graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 2001, cum laude, and from the Duquesne University School of Law in 2004. She served as a judicial law clerk to the McKean County Court of Common Pleas from 2004 to 2007 and a deputy judicial law clerk in the Pennsylvania Superior Court from 2008 to 2010. In 2011 and 2012 she was solicitor for the Bradford Sanitary Authority, the Bradford Regional Airport, and the McKean County Housing Authority.
From 2012 to 2021 she was in private practice at Stacy Wallace Law, LLC. She also served as the President of the McKean County Bar Association and on the Board of Directors for Northwestern Pennsylvania Legal Service.