Fresno County superior court race tightens, Hammerschmidt nears runoff

A Fresno County Superior Court seat that looked settled on election night tightened enough to put a November runoff within reach, with Jeffrey Hammerschmidt finishing June 2 just short of the majority he needs to win outright. If the count holds, Fresno County voters will not pick Seat No. 7 until the fall, extending a race that already says a lot about how local justice gets decided.

Hammerschmidt held 49.58 percent in the June 10 update, only 371 votes below the majority threshold. Public defender Jose Salazar stood at 34.88 percent, and attorney Curtis Sok had 15.26 percent. With roughly 2,100 ballots still left to be processed as of June 11, plus cure ballots that could arrive by June 24 at 5 p.m., the final margin could still move before the county decides whether the race clears 50 percent or heads to November.

Seat No. 7 is the contest to replace retiring Judge D. Tyler Tharpe, and it is one of the clearest examples of how Fresno County’s judicial elections can reshape the bench. Thirteen candidates are competing for seven open Superior Court seats this year, a large turnover for a court that usually changes more slowly when judges retire mid-term and are replaced by gubernatorial appointment before later facing voters.

That makes the runoff question more than a procedural footnote. If Hammerschmidt does not finish above 50 percent, the county will have to wait until November to choose between him and Salazar, extending the timeline for filling a seat that affects criminal cases, family disputes, civil claims and the day-to-day work of Fresno County Superior Court. Five judicial races had already been won outright, but two, including Seat No. 7, were still trending toward a runoff.

Hammerschmidt brings a long local record to the race. He was admitted to the State Bar of California on December 11, 1987, and was identified in a 1997 California Bar Journal article as one of the prosecutors in the Dana Ewell triple-murder case, which generated thousands of pages of investigative records. Salazar, admitted to the State Bar on January 9, 2012, has served as an attorney in the Fresno County Public Defender’s Office.

Seat No. 6 also was edging toward a runoff, with Ashley Paulson at 47.12 percent, Fresno County senior deputy district attorney Steven Ueltzen at 29.84 percent and public defender Deidre Adams at 22.80 percent. Fresno County’s Superior Court has 47 judges and one current vacancy, so even a handful of closely watched seats can change how the court functions for years. County officials must report final results by July 3, and the state is scheduled to certify the election on July 10.