There’s a new magistrate in Haines. Orion Hughes-Knowles began presiding over cases at the local courthouse this week. He will be taking over for Magistrate Mary Kay Germain and Judge Linn Asper.
Orion Hughes-Knowles was born in Hawaii and grew up in Sitka.
He says he first became interested in law after he got a degree in sociology and did a few years of social work with the Suquamish Tribe in Washington.
“While doing that social work I felt that there were avenues that I thought could be more broadly effective and I found that the law was a mechanism for that path,” Hughes-Knowles says.
Hughes-Knowles went to law school at Washington and Lee School of Law in Virginia and graduated in 2019. Soon after he began working as a judicial law clerk in Alaska. While clerking for Judge Brent E. Bennet in Fairbanks, he saw the opportunity to become a magistrate in Haines.
“I thought, ‘Wow, Haines has always been a place that I’ve really enjoyed.’ I had the opportunity to come here for different events in high school. I also had the opportunity when I was playing in a band—we played here for the Southeast Fair. I’ve always really enjoyed my time in Haines.”
Hughes-Knowles will be taking over the magistrate position for the northern 1st Judicial District from Mary Kay Germain, who lives in Yakutat. Over the past few years, Judge Linn Asper has been filling in part time to preside over cases at the Haines courthouse.
He came out of retirement in 2016 when he learned that cases in Haines would be handled remotely from Yakutat.
“I offered to go back because it just seemed to me that serving Haines, which is an important community in Northern Southeast, serving it by phone I just didn’t like that,” Asper says. “At the time, I was signing on to be a person in the court so people could see you and you could see them and that would provide better access to the justice system.”
Asper says ironically, there haven’t been any in-person hearings for months due to the pandemic.
Asper worked in the legal system in Alaska in various roles for many years. He says there are both challenges and advantages to working in a court in a small town.
“I find it very interesting to work in a small town. It’s a problem because you know everybody. You can’t do every case sometimes because you do know everybody. But at the same time that gives you a better insight as a judge on to some of the problems that the community faces and the people face that come before you,” Asper says.
Now that there is a full-time magistrate living in Haines, Asper will be able to re-enter retirement.
Magistrate Hughes-Knowles will be based in Haines, but he is responsible for presiding over cases from Skagway, Yakutat, and Hoonah as well.
As a magistrate, he will handle everything from traffic tickets and Fish and Game violations, to domestic violence protection orders and arrest warrants.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that Orion Hughes-Knowles was born in Sitka. He was born in Hawaii in 1988 then moved to Sitka in 1999.
