| Established: | 1861 |
| Jurisdiction: | Lake County, California |
| Coordinates: | 39.0436°N -122.9167°W |
| Appealsto: | California Court of Appeal for the First District |
| Chiefjudgetitle: | Presiding Judge |
| Chiefjudgename: | Hon. J. David Markham[1] |
| Chiefjudgetitle2: | Assistant Presiding Judge |
| Chiefjudgename2: | Hon. Shanda M. Harry |
| Chiefjudgetitle3: | Court Executive Officer |
| Chiefjudgename3: | Krista D. LeVier |
The Superior Court of California, County of Lake, also known as the Lake County Superior Court or Lake Superior Court, is the branch of the California superior court with jurisdiction over Lake County.
Lake County was partitioned from Napa and Mendocino counties in 1861.[2]
Lakeport was selected as county seat in the first election in June 1861, and a two-storey wooden court house with a footprint of approximately was erected; a history states it was not "pretentious or showy ... but it answered the purposes for which it was designed very well indeed."[3] The court house was destroyed by a suspected arson on the night of February 15, 1867, and all the county records were lost in the fire, except for one of the Treasurer's books. With the destruction of the court house, the county seat was temporarily moved to Lower Lake; after it returned to Lakeport in 1870, preparations were made for a new permanent court house.[3] Early county judges included O.A. Munn (1861–63), J.B. Holloway (1864–71), and E.M. Paul (1872–79); after the new California constitution established the Superior Court system, judges included R.J Hudson (1880–89), R.W. Crump (1890–1903; died in office), and M.S. Sayre (1903;1904–14).[4]
The contract for the new court house was let to A.P. Pettit on May 27, 1870, for $17,000 and it was completed in 1871. The same historian described the 1871 courthouse, a two-storey brick structure with a tin roof and a footprint of, as "not at all showy [but] plain and tasty".[3] It received a coat of cement in March 1906, and withstood the 1906 San Francisco earthquake one month later. The 1871 courthouse was added to the list of California Historical Landmarks as No. 897; it also was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1970.
The current courthouse was completed in 1968 behind the 1871 courthouse and dedicated on September 13; the old courthouse was turned into a museum for county and Native American history.[5] [6] The 1968 courthouse is a three-storey structure with brick archways on each face, designed by James Prather and Robert W. Stevens.[5] [7]
In addition to the main courthouse in Lakeport, a satellite court operates in the county's largest city, Clearlake.