The search for a new Virginia Supreme Court justice involves at least 12 candidates and a fair amount of uncertainty over who will make the selection -- the General Assembly or Gov. Tim Kaine.

If the legislature is unable to make an appointment when it reconvenes Wednesday for a special session on transportation, the job will fall to the governor.

What route the selection process takes in the coming days could affect the chances of Clifford Weckstein, a Roanoke Circuit Court judge who is said to be one of the contenders for the high court seat.

"From what I hear, Judge Weckstein is in the mix," House Majority Leader Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, said earlier this week.

But Weckstein's prospects might be stronger with the governor than the General Assembly, Griffith said, because legislators are more likely to elevate someone from the Virginia Court of Appeals, the state's intermediate appellate court.

That would open up a seat on the Court of Appeals to be filled at the same time, creating a scenario where the more appointments there are to be made, the greater the chances of a statewide consensus. A vacancy on the State Corporation Commission provides even more room for a package deal.

The SCC seat "could be part of the horse trading that's going on, because it's considered to be a judicial appointment," said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who follows the judicial selection process.

Of the 12 candidates who sought endorsement from the Virginia State Bar, four sit on the Court of Appeals. The rest are Circuit Court judges, with the exception of one deputy attorney general.

Although Virginia lawmakers have been at odds recently over judicial appointments, Griffith said there's a possibility the seat could be filled during the special session, which began June 23 and resumes Wednesday.

"It's clearly our preference that we get the vacancy filled," he said. If the General Assembly completes its special session without acting, whoever is appointed by Kaine would have to be approved for a full term when lawmakers return to Richmond next winter.

There has been little discussion so far by legislators about who they might appoint during a session that was supposed to be limited to issues of highway construction and maintenance funding.

"I have not heard a lot of chatter about it," said Del. Onzlee Ware, D-Roanoke. "Everybody is scrambling now on the transportation bill."

The Supreme Court vacancy was created when Justice Steven Agee of Salem was appointed by Congress to serve on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Agee was sworn in to the Richmond-based appellate court Wednesday.

Until Agee's departure, the Roanoke Valley -- which makes up just 3 percent of Virginia's population -- had two residents sitting on the seven-member Supreme Court. Justice Lawrence Koontz is also from Salem.

Some observers believe that Weckstein's Roanoke address could work against him if legislators from other parts of the state decide to put an end to such a geographical quirk.

"I personally think he would be a great Supreme Court justice," Griffith said. "But we have had an anomaly here in that we have had two justices in the Roanoke Valley out of seven, which is politically unheard of."

Meanwhile, Weckstein has been endorsed by several local and statewide bar groups, including the Roanoke and Salem-Roanoke County bar associations and the Virginia Bar Association.

On Thursday, the Virginia State Bar listed Weckstein as one of 10 candidates it considers "highly qualified" for the position. Giles County Circuit Court Judge Colin Gibb, the only other candidate from Western Virginia to be considered by the state bar, was found to be "qualified".

Appointed by the General Assembly to the Roanoke Valley's 23rd Judicial Circuit in 1987, Weckstein is a "superb opinion writer" and "is considered to be a very bright and capable trial judge, who is also a legal scholar," according to a report from the state bar released Thursday.

"He works extremely hard and is well-prepared at trial," the report read. "And, as mentioned by several members of the trial bar, Judge Weckstein has not forgotten what it was like to be a trial lawyer."

While the General Assembly will have the first crack at appointing a Supreme Court justice, the state bar's report was sent to Kaine. A spokesman for the governor said that while Kaine has no authority to make an appointment as long as the legislature is in session, he's prepared to act if that system bogs down.

"The process is truly a Rubik's Cube sort of situation," Griffith said, "where you move one piece and everything changes."