A Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton partner in San Diego is ending her career with a conventional benchmark: a judgeship. But Laura Taylor’s path has been anything but straightforward.

During her decades-long stint at Sheppard Mullin, Taylor was an associate, a part-time associate, a partner, a special counsel and, finally, a partner again before her recent appointment (.pdf) to a bankruptcy judgeship in the Southern District of California.