Ashley Wells Cox wins 4th Circuit judge seat

Voters on Tuesday across Duval, Nassau and Clay counties chose attorney Ashley Wells Cox, a former assistant state attorney in the Fourth Circuit, to become a judge on the 4th Judicial Circuit Court.

Unofficial results as of Tuesday at 9 p.m. show Cox received 53.36% of total votes cast, compared to her opponent, attorney Nancy Cleaveland’s 46.64%, according to the Florida Division of Elections. With all 226 precincts reporting in the circuit’s three counties, Cox had 83,969 votes, and Cleaveland garnered 73,394.

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While the race was nonpartisan, Cleaveland had touted herself in ads as the “conservative” candidate, though both candidates received financial backing from conservative political action committees.

Cox attributes her interest in constitutional law to her father, former Florida Supreme Court Justice Charles Wells, who played a key role in halting the 2000 presidential election recount in Florida. Now a director at Bedell, Dittmar, DeVault, Pillans & Coxe, where she has practiced since 2006, she has focused primarily on family law for the past seven years.

Florida’s sixth-largest trial court, the Fourth Judicial Circuit employs 55 judges, 35 at the circuit level and 20 in county courts, according to the court’s website. The state has a two-tier trial court system consisting of circuit and county courts within each of Florida’s 20 judicial circuits. Judges in the courts are elected by popular vote or may be appointed by the governor if a vacancy arises. Both circuit and county judges serve six-year terms, at the end of with a judge must be re-elected to retain the seat.