Geoffrey Francis Brown (born May 20, 1943), known as Jeff Brown, is an American attorney and retired government official. From 2001 to 2007, Brown served as a member of the California Public Utilities Commission.

Early life and education

Brown was born May 20, 1943, in San Francisco, California, and attended schools in both San Francisco and

Marin County Marin County is a county located in the northwestern part of the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 262,231. Its county seat and largest city is San Rafael. Marin County is acros ...

. Brown is the nephew of former Governor Pat Brown and the cousin of former Governor Jerry Brown and former State Treasurer Kathleen Brown. Brown received his bachelor's degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1964, and graduated from San Francisco Law School in 1970. He served two stints in the U.S. Air Force (1965 and 1968–1969) as an enlisted man.

Career

Brown was admitted to the bar in January 1971 and practiced with his father until joining the San Francisco Public Defender's Office in October 1971. In 1978 he was elected

Public Defender A public defender is a lawyer appointed to represent people who otherwise cannot reasonably afford to hire a lawyer to defend themselves in a trial. Several countries provide people with public defenders, including the UK, Hungary and Singapore, ...

of San Francisco and was re-elected five times. During Brown's tenure, the Public Defender's Office grew to a staff of 83 attorneys and 40 support personnel. Brown was succeeded in his position by Kimiko Burton, the daughter of John Burton. Brown was appointed by Governor

Gray Davis Joseph Graham "Gray" Davis Jr. (born December 26, 1942) is an American attorney and former politician who served as the 37th governor of California from 1999 to 2003. In 2003, only a few months into his second term, Davis was recalled and remov ...

in January 2001 as a Commissioner of the California Public Utilities Commission and confirmed in March by the State Senate. His term expired in January 2007 after which he joined the

John F. Kennedy University College of Law John F. Kennedy University was a private university based in California with offices in Pleasant Hill, San Jose in California; Natick, Massachusetts; and Willemstad, Curaçao. The university was founded in 1965 to offer degrees and certificat ...

, teaching Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, and Evidence. He was, for a time, a member of faculty at the Hastings College of Law but as of December 2022, he is no longer listed in their faculty directory.

Personal life

A widower, he has three grown daughters, Miranda, Simone and Olivia.

References

External links

*https://web.archive.org/web/20060206152954/http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/static/aboutcpuc/commissioners/02brown/index.htm 1943 births Living people University of California, Berkeley alumni San Francisco Law School alumni Brown family (California) Public defenders {{US-law-bio-stub