# Alameda County District Attorney's Office

The Alameda County District Attorney's Office is the legal agency charged with prosecuting felony and misdemeanor crimes in Alameda County, California. Ursula Jones Dickson has served as district attorney since 2025.
Occupants of this office have gone on to serve in the California State Legislature and the United States House of Representatives and as mayor of Oakland, attorney general of California, secretary of state of California, governor of California, and chief justice of the United States.

## History

The Alameda County District Attorney's Office was created in 1853 upon the establishment of Alameda County. William H. Combs was appointed the first district attorney upon the office's creation. In the office's early decades, district attorneys often came from private practice and served short terms in office before either returning to private practice, becoming judges, or seeking higher political office.
Earl Warren served as Alameda County district attorney from 1925 to 1939. He would later go on to serve one term as attorney general of California and three terms as governor of California, and he was also chosen by New York governor Thomas E. Dewey as the Republican vice presidential nominee in the 1948 presidential election. In 1953, he was nominated for chief justice of the United States by President Dwight D. Eisenhower and served until 1969. The Warren Court handed down a number of landmark decisions, including Brown v. Board of Education (1954), Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States (1964), Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), Miranda v. Arizona (1966), and Loving v. Virginia (1967).
In 2009, Nancy O'Malley became the first woman to serve as Alameda County district attorney. She retired in 2022 and vowed not to choose a successor, allowing the first open election for district attorney since Warren's retirement in 1938. Pamela Price was elected to succeed her, becoming the county's first African American district attorney. Price is also the county's first district attorney to be recalled, having lost a recall effort against her in 2024. The Alameda County Board of Supervisors appointed Ursula Jones Dickson to succeed Price in 2025.

## List of Alameda County district attorneys

| # | Name | Term |
| 1 | William H. Combs | 1853–1854 |
| 2 | John S. Chipman | 1854–1855 |
| 3 | George M. Blake | 1855–1856 |
| 4 | William Van Voorhies | 1856–1857 |
| 5 | William H. Glascock | 1857–1859 |
| 6 | William W. Crane | 1859–1863 |
| 7 | Stephen G. Nye | 1863–1865 |
| 8 | George M. Blake | 1865–1869 |
| 9 | Oscar H. La Grange | 1869–1871 |
| 10 | Stephen P. Wright | 1869–1871 |
| 11 | A. A. Moore | 1871–1875 |
| 12 | John R. Glascock | 1875–1877 |
| 13 | Henry Vrooman | 1877–1879 |
| 14 | E. M. Gibson | 1879–1883 |
| 15 | Samuel P. Hall | 1883–1889 |
| 16 | George W. Reed | 1889–1893 |
| 17 | Charles E. Snook | 1893–1899 |
| 18 | John J. Allen | 1899–1907 |
| 19 | Everett Brown | 1907–1909 |
| 20 | William Donahue | 1909–1913 |
| 21 | William H. L. Hines | 1913–1917 |
| 22 | Ezra Decoto | 1917–1925 |
| 23 | Earl Warren | 1925–1939 |
| 24 | Ralph E. Hoyt | 1939–1947 |
| 25 | J. Frank Coakley | 1947–1969 |
| 26 | D. Lowell Jensen | 1969–1981 |
| 27 | John J. Meehan | 1981–1994 |
| 28 | Tom Orloff | 1994–2009 |
| 29 | Nancy O'Malley | 2009–2023 |
| 30 | Pamela Price | 2023–2024 |
| – | Royl Roberts (acting) | 2024–2025 |
| 31 | Ursula Jones Dickson | 2025–present |