Belleville attorney Tameeka Purchase has been selected by the sitting St. Clair County circuit judges to fill the associate judge vacancy left by the resignation of former associate judge Walter C. Brandon.
Purchase is currently working as an attorney with Sandifer Purchase.
She graduated from Webster University in Illinois in 2007, and received her law degree from Drake Law School at Des Moines University in 2010.
She began her legal career as an assistant attorney general in the Worker’s Compensation Bureau of the Office of the Illinois Attorney General.
Purchase represented Illinois, "overseeing a docket of over 200 cases involving injured workers, gaining extensive worker’s compensation trial and appeal experience," according to her attorney biography.
She then worked for the St. Clair County State’s Attorneys Office, where she handled child support cases before she was promoted to the felony division.
Purchase is a founding partner of Sandifer Purchase. She previously worked as an associate at Clayborne, Sabo and Wagner.
She is on the board of directors of the Southern Illinois Regional Wellness Center in Washington Park, which provides low cost medical services to the community.
She also sits on the board of directors of Hearts of Faith, a not-for-profit group that helps single mothers and youths.
Purchase was on a troop with the Girl Scouts of Southern Illinois, and is also National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Purchase is the second appointment to the bench to fill an associate judge vacancy while former circuit judge Robert LeChien's seat remains open following his August 2017 death.
Belleville attorney Alana I. Mejias, 35, was appointed associate judge in March to fill the vacancy left by former associate judge Randall Kelley.