By Matt Masich, LAW WEEK COLORADO
Stephanie Villafuerte, Colorado’s next U.S. attorney provided she commits no major atrocities in the next month or so, had to answer an exhaustive questionnaire from the U.S. Senate judiciary committee before a confirmation hearing could be scheduled.
Villafuerte worked in the Denver district attorney’s and U.S. attorney’s offices before becoming Gov. Bill Ritter’s deputy chief of staff in 2007. The judiciary committee publicly released Villafuerte’s 20-page questionnaire response last week, and it’s posted below.
A few of the tidbits gleaned from her answers: She let her attorney registration status go to inactive for the first two years she worked for Ritter, she apparently memorized speeches or winged it at the 30 public speaking engagements she listed (none of which she had the text for) and she has no experience with civil cases or bench trials.
The lack of civil experience isn’t insurmountable said Bob Miller, U.S. attorney for Colorado during of the 1980s. The Colorado office has a higher-than-average caseload than most U.S. attorney’s offices because many federal agencies have regional HQs in Denver, Miller told Law Week shortly after Villafuerte’s nomination was announced. Like Villafuerte, Miller had worked mostly on the criminal side of the law before becoming U.S. attorney, but after a few months of immersing himself in the subject matter, he was able to handle it, he said.

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