AircraftOwner Online

I just spent a most-enjoyable 90 minutes today with brand new Administrative Law Judge Alfonso J. Montaño. I was very pleased to have been the first "journalist", either from the aviation community or from the legal community, to have been afforded the time to interview him. He will be introduced to the Washington, D.C. aviation legal community tomorrow morning.

A native of the Taos, New Mexico area, Judge Montaño has an easy, broad smile which he flashed many times during the course of our meeting, particularly when the discussions turned to his newly-found love of flying. He has been married to the same woman -- Trish, a third-grade teacher -- since 1982. They have two children: a son who is in a Doctoral program in Psychology; and a daughter, who is a college senior pursuing a degree in Art History. His son enjoys flying with Dad; his daughter had a bad experience with a discovery flight years ago and has yet to take advantage of Dad's offers to take her up. He remains hopeful that she will come to understand, and not to fear, his new passion.

Other than flying, Judge Montaño is a huge history buff, with a special interest in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. In fact, when I asked him to tell me about his favorite flight to date, he told me that he flew to Tangier Island, in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay, which the British had used as a staging area for their assalult on Baltimore during the War of 1812. Judge Montaño also loves music of all kinds. He plays the guitar, but confesses that he, "hasn't advanced much since high school."

I confirmed that Judge Montaño will be taking over the Southeastern Circuit that recently-retired Judge William A. Pope, Jr. had served for so long. I also confirmed that Judge Montaño does not have an existing backlog of cases that were to have been decided by Judge Pope since his retirement. Those cases have been handled by the other three Administrative Law Judges.

Judge Montaño has been in rigorous training to understand his new role as an NTSB ALJ. But he is not starting from scratch by a long shot. He has been in public service all his adult life, and has been an Administrative Law Judge for the past 15 years, working to decide appeals concerning eligibility for Social Security benefits, first in Portland, Oregon and then in the Washington, DC area. He also spent much of his career assisting in Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse cases, first as an investigator, later as an assistant attorney, then as a Trial Attorney for the Department of Justice, and finally as an Administrative Law Judge. He has an interest in all things medical and is looking forward to seeing how medical issues are presented in the aviation legal context.

Learn more about my interview with Judge Montaño in the October Issue of AircraftOwner.