Career
As the senior District Judge of Bexar County (in semi-retired) status, he was appointed to preside over the Tom DeLay campaign finance trial in Austin, Texas by Chief Justice of Texas Supreme Court Wallace B. Jefferson after two judges (Administrative Judge B B Schraub and District Judge Bob Perkins) were recused in the case. In 2015, Priest presided over the exoneration hearing of the "San Antonio Four", four women collectively accused of child molestation in the 1990s, and ultimately ruled that the women should be given a new trial. Priest has used shock probation, releasing convicted criminals from prison shortly into their sentence with the expectation that the brief prison experience will be sufficient to rehabilitate the prisoner.
His use of that methodology has drawn criticism and defenders.
Priest attended Saint Mary"s University Law School. He authored a criminal procedure casebook.
