Gov. Rick Perry has appointed Judge Debra Lehrmann to the Place 3 seat that Harriet O’Neill will soon vacate on the Texas Supreme Court. Lehrmann, a Fort Worth District Court judge, won the Republican nomination for that seat in a runoff against former state Rep. Rick Green, R-Dripping Springs.

In August, O’Neill said she would leave the court when her term finished at the end of 2010. More recently, she announced she would step down from the court on June 21, allowing Perry the chance to appoint her replacement. Lehrmann faces Democrat Jim Sharp, who sits on Houston’s 1st Court of Appeals, and Libertarian William Bryan Strange III in November’s general election.

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