She was a trial attorney of the Antitrust Division of U.S. Department of Justice in Los Angeles in 1979.

Gonzalez was nominated by President George H. W. Bush on April 9, 1992, to a seat vacated by Judge J. Lawrence Irving.

Born in Palo Alto, California, Gonzalez completed a Bachelor of Arts degree at Stanford University in 1970, and a Juris Doctor at the University of Arizona College of Law (now known as the James E. Rogers College of Law) in 1973.

California Governor Pete Wilson appointed Gonzalez as a state judge on the San Diego Superior Court in 1991.

Gonzalez's decision was unanimously overturned by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal on April 17, 2013.