With the retirement of Circuit Judge Stacia Warren and the elevation to Circuit Court of County Judge Lauren Blocker, the Judicial Nominating Commission for the circuit will conduct a new round of interviews for candidates looking to fill the two vacancies. Applications are due by June 23.
The nominating commission, whose nine members are appointed by the governor, hold public interviews of the candidates in 15-minute increments. They deliberate in private before sending the governor a short-list of three candidates for each vacancy. The governor makes all judicial appointments in the state’s 20 circuits.
The Seventh Judicial Circuit includes Flagler, Volusia, St. Johns and Putnam County, with 27 circuit judges and 17 county judges. Circuit judges may be assigned in any of the circuit’s four counties. County judges serve in their home counties, as did Blocker, in St. Johns, before her elevation. She will serve in Volusia County as a circuit court judge.
Flagler County’s current roster of judges includes Circuit Judges Dawn Nichols and Chris France, and County Judges Melissa Distler and Andrea Totten, with senior judges occasionally filling in.
DeSantis announced the two Seventh Circuit appointments on May 7–that of Blocker and that of Michele Simonsen, who was appointed to Volusia County Court. Simonsen had served as an Assistant State Attorney for the Seventh Judicial Circuit since 1998.
Blocker was appointed to fill the vacancy created when Judge Matthew Foxman unexpectedly resigned last November to care for his health. Blocker had been a county judge since 2021. She’d been a judicial clerk in federal court and had been corporate counsel for Fidelity Information Services before DeSantis appointed her to a newly created county judgeship in the county. (See a Q&A in the St. Augustine Recorder here.)
She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Florida and her law degree from Florida Coastal School of Law. She is married to Jeremiah Blocker, whose Douglas Law Firm in St. Augustine represents the City of Palm Coast (with Jeremiah Blocker and Marcus Duffy as the city’s attorneys).
Warren served as a county judge for over 20 years before her resignation in 2012, when she unsuccessfully campaigned to replace State Attorney R.J. Larizza. She ran again in 2016 and won a circuit court judgeship. Judges by law may not serve past age 75. Her retirement is effective June 5.
Warren’s husband, Dan Warren, who died in 2011, had been the State Attorney who famously brought down the KKK in St. Augustine in 1964. He also served as a Daytona Beach city commissioner. Warren’s son, Raymond Warren, was an assistant public defender in the circuit, and particularly in Flagler County, until his retirement a few years ago. He remains one of FlaglerLive’s most frequent and erudite commenters, writing under the handle of Ray W.
Applications for the two openings in the Seventh Judicial Circuit have to be in by 9 a.m. on June 23, by email here.
According to the request for applications, “A complete application shall include: a signed Certificate, Financial History, notarized Form 6, Judicial Application Data Record, FDLE form, a writing sample, and a current color photograph. All questions in the application must be answered fully and completely. Applicants must include current contact information for all judges, co-counsel, opposing counsel, and references to facilitate the background investigation. Each .pdf file should be titled so that the applicant’s full name and “original” or “redacted” is readily apparent before opening the attachment. The application and all attachments should be combined into a single .pdf file.”
The application is below.
Judicial Appointments Application (2025)
Judicial-Appointment-Application-2025
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