Diane Bellas became the Alameda County Public Defender in 2000,
after performing a range of assignments over two decades in the office,
including Felony Trials, Career Criminal, LPS and Probate Conservatorships, Homicide Team and branch and division supervision.
She has handled over fifty murder cases, including special-circumstance
cases.

As Public Defender, Ms. Bellas is responsible for seven branch
offices and 113 attorneys, as well as her own caseload of Homeless Court clients with whom she has appeared since the Court's inception in 2004.

Ms. Bellas is a past President of the California Public Defenders Association and is Vice-President of the Board of C.U.R.A. (Carnales Unidos Reformando Adictos), a community-based, substance-abuse
recovery program in the East Bay Area. She serves as Chair of the
Alameda County Managers Affiliation and is a member of the Alameda
County Community Focused Courts Planning Group. She is a member
emeritus of the American Inn of Court, Earl Warren Chapter, and was a
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Urban Health Initiative Fellow. She has also served, by appointment of the Chief Justice, on the Judicial
Council of California, Collaborative Justice Courts Advisory Committee.

A lifetime resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, Ms. Bellas
received her Juris Doctor from Boalt Hall. She studied in the Creative
Writing Program at San Francisco State University, from which she
received her Master of Arts in English, and at California State
University, Hayward, receiving Bachelor of Arts degrees in Philosophy
and English.