Federal Judge Disparaged By Trump Grew Up In East Chicago, Ind.
(CBS) – Donald Trump has been on the defense -- getting flak from members of his own political party for claiming a federal judge is biased against him because of the judge's Latino heritage.
CBS 2's Vince Gerasole reports on the judge's Chicago area ties.
Gonzalo Curiel was the youngest of four children who grew up in northwest Indiana.
He would go on to graduate high school at Bishop Noll in Hammond and then attend college and law school at Indiana University, making his family proud, according to his brother.
Raul Curiel says their parents, Francisca and Salvador, immigrated to this country legally from a small town near Puerta Vallarta, Mexico. Salvador raised the family while working in northwest Indiana's steel mills.
Their son, Gonzalo, began his legal career locally, then moved to California, where as a U.S. attorney he received death threats while prosecuting an infamous drug cartel.
That's the back story to comments made by presumptive Republican presidential nominee about judge Curiel's ethnicity and an alleged conflict of interest as he presides over the Trump University fraud case. Trump claims Curiel is angry over his immigration stance, which includes plans to build a wall along the U.S. border.
Attorney Roy Dominguez knew Curiel through the Lake County Hispanic Bar Association. He has high regard for his former colleague.
"He's kind of like one of those guys you had in high school, the person you designate as 'most likely to succeed' -- that was Gonzalo," Dominguez says.
