TV & VIDEO - Sept. 19, 1989

Dallas District Judge Catherine Crier, who will turn in her gavel at the end of this month to become a Cable News Network anchor, feels the two careers are a lot alike. “A judge works to get the facts concerning a situation and puts them together in the form of a verdict and delivers it to an audience--the jury. I would say the parallels are considerable,” says the 34-year-old Crier, the youngest woman ever elected to the Texas bench. She has no news experience, but learned to like the public spotlight while giving speeches in the legal community. She hired a former CBS talent scout as her agent, made a videotape of her delivering the news and sent it to CNN. Paul Amos, CNN executive vice president of programming, said that when he saw the tape, “I realized Judge Crier had real potential.” She’s expected to be on the air by the middle of next month.