By Sean O’Driscoll 

A Dublin-born attorney has said she is both excited and relieved after President Bush nominated her for as a federal judge in Washington, D.C. 

Jennifer M. Anderson, 45, from Killester in north Dublin, is set to take a 15-year term as a Superior Court judge if her nomination is approved by the Senate. 

She is currently chief of the homicide and major crimes section of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington. In the late 1990s she was a special prosecutor in the civil rights division of the Justice Department. 

“The new position will be interesting. I’ve been doing my current job for 14 years so it’s really going to be a change,” she said.

Her family emigrated when she was 8-years-old after her father answered an ad for factory workers placed in an Irish newspaper. “He didn’t tell my mother that he had applied but she came around to the idea,” she added. 

Anderson, a former student at St. Bridget’s primary school in Killester, said that her parents, who live in Baltimore, Maryland, are more excited about the appointment than she is. 

“My generation in the family are the most overly educated people known to mankind, as my father would continuously tell us,” she said. 

She added that she would not rule out an application for a higher position in the judiciary after she has spent some years in the Superior Court. 

“Oh, you always have ambitions. I’m always ever hopeful. I wouldn’t hold your breath on a bid for the Supreme Court. I think this is my big shot to fame here,” she said. 

As Washington, D.C. is the only part of the U.S. that is not a state, all federal judicial positions are nominated by the White House. She was interviewed for the job by the associate White House counsel and was one of three people shortlisted for the position.