ATLANTA – David Nahmias was unanimously elected by his colleagues on the Georgia Supreme Court Thursday to become the court’s chief justice starting July 1.
Current Chief Justice Harold Melton announced last month that he would be stepping down from the court this summer after serving on the court for 16 years.
Nahmias, currently the court’s presiding justice, was appointed to the state Supreme Court in 2009 by then-Gov. Sonny Perdue to fill a vacancy. Georgia voters then elected Nahmias to a six-year term in 2010 and reelected him in 2016.
Before joining the court, Nahmias was U.S. attorney for the Atlanta-based Northern District of Georgia. Before that, he served as a senior member of the U.S. Justice Department.
The DeKalb County native earned his undergraduate degree at Duke University and his law degree from Harvard Law School, where he served on the Law Review with former President Barack Obama and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch. Nahmias went on to serve as a law clerk to the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
In his new role as chief justice in Georgia, Nahmias will lead the state’s judicial branch and act as the Supreme Court’s spokesman. He also will chair the Georgia Judicial Council, the policymaking body for the judicial branch.
Georgia chief justices serve one four-year term.
Also on Thursday, the justices unanimously elected Justice Michael Boggs to succeed Nahmias as presiding justice.