Dennis Wayne Shedd (born January 28, 1953) is a former
United States circuit judge
In the United States, federal judges are judges who serve on courts established under Article Three of the U.S. Constitution. They include the chief justice and the associate justices of the U.S. Supreme Court, the circuit judges of the U.S. ...
of the
United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (in case citations, 4th Cir.) is a federal court located in Richmond, Virginia, with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:
* District of Maryland ...
.
Background
Shedd attended
Orangeburg Preparatory Schools in
Orangeburg, South Carolina
Orangeburg, also known as ''The Garden City'', is the principal city in and the county seat of Orangeburg County, South Carolina, United States. The population of the city was 13,964 according to the 2010 United States Census and declined to 1 ...
. He received his
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...
degree from
Wofford College
Wofford College is a private liberal arts college in Spartanburg, South Carolina. It was founded in 1854. The campus is a national arboretum and one of the few four-year institutions in the southeastern United States founded before the America ...
, his
Juris Doctor from the
University of South Carolina School of Law
The University of South Carolina School of Law, also known as South Carolina Law School, is a professional school within the University of South Carolina. The school of law was founded in 1867, and remains the only public and non-profit law scho ...
and a
Master of Laws
A Master of Laws (M.L. or LL.M.; Latin: ' or ') is an advanced postgraduate academic degree, pursued by those either holding an undergraduate academic law degree, a professional law degree, or an undergraduate degree in a related subject. In mos ...
from the
Georgetown University Law Center
The Georgetown University Law Center (Georgetown Law) is the law school of Georgetown University, a private research university in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1870 and is the largest law school in the United States by enrollment and ...
. He went on to become chief counsel and staff director for the Senate Committee on the Judiciary while in the employ of Senator
Strom Thurmond. He moved to South Carolina to practice law in 1988. During that time, he served as an adjunct professor of law at the University of South Carolina School of Law.
Federal judicial service
Service on district court
President
George H. W. Bush nominated Shedd on October 17, 1990, to the
. Shedd was confirmed on October 27, 1990. He received his commission on October 30, 1990.
His service as a district court judge was terminated on December 10, 2002, when he was elevated to the
4th Circuit Court.
Service on court of appeals
Shedd was nominated by President
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
on September 4, 2001, and was confirmed by the
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and pow ...
on November 19, 2002, by a 55–44 vote. He received his judicial commission on November 26, 2002.
Shedd assumed
senior status
Senior status is a form of semi- retirement for United States federal judges. To qualify, a judge in the federal court system must be at least 65 years old, and the sum of the judge's age and years of service as a federal judge must be at leas ...
on January 30, 2018.
He retired from the court on May 2, 2022.
Notable decisions
In 2007, Judge Shedd wrote for a fractured panel which found that the
procedural default
Procedural default is a concept in American federal law that requires a state prisoner seeking a writ of ''habeas corpus
''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a recourse in law through which a person can report an unlawful deten ...
doctrine prevented the court from hearing the constitutional claims of a death row inmate. On May 25, 2017, Judge Shedd wrote a dissent when the ''
en banc
In law, an en banc session (; French for "in bench"; also known as ''in banc'', ''in banco'' or ''in bank'') is a session in which a case is heard before all the judges of a court (before the entire bench) rather than by one judge or a smaller p ...
'' circuit upheld a lower court's injunction against the President's
travel ban by a vote of 10–3 in ''
Int'l Refugee Assistance Project v. Trump
''International Refugee Assistance Project v. Trump'', 857 F. 3d 554 (4th Cir. 2017), was a 2017 decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, sitting '' en banc'', upholding an injunction against enforcement of Execut ...
''.
References
Sources
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shedd, Dennis Wayne
1953 births
Living people
20th-century American judges
21st-century American judges
Georgetown University Law Center alumni
Judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
Judges of the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina
People from Orangeburg County, South Carolina
United States court of appeals judges appointed by George W. Bush
United States district court judges appointed by George H. W. Bush
University of South Carolina alumni
Wofford College alumni
University of South Carolina faculty