Pamela Pepper (born 1964) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as the chief United States district judge of the

United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin (in case citations, E.D. Wis.) is a federal trial court of limited jurisdiction. The court is under the auspices of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, ...

and former chief United States bankruptcy judge of the same court.

Education

Pepper received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

degree in 1986 from

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

. She received a

Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...

in 1989 from

Cornell Law School Cornell Law School is the law school of Cornell University, a private Ivy League university in Ithaca, New York. One of the five Ivy League law schools, it offers four law degree programs, JD, LLM, MSLS and JSD, along with several dual-deg ...

Career

She began her legal career as a

law clerk A law clerk or a judicial clerk is a person, generally someone who provides direct counsel and assistance to a lawyer or judge by researching issues and drafting legal opinions for cases before the court. Judicial clerks often play significant ...

for Judge Frank M. Johnson Jr. of the

United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit (in case citations, 11th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the following U.S. district courts: * Middle District of Alabama * Northern District of Alabama * ...

from 1989 to 1990. She served as an

assistant United States attorney An assistant United States attorney (AUSA) is an official career civil service position in the U.S. Department of Justice composed of lawyers working under the U.S. Attorney of each U.S. federal judicial district. They represent the federal gove ...

in the Northern District of Illinois from 1990 to 1994 and in the Eastern District of Wisconsin from 1994 to 1997. From 1997 to 2005, she worked in private practice as a criminal defense attorney, where she handled both trials and appeals in State and Federal courts. Starting in 2005 until 2009, Pepper concurrently served as a bankruptcy judge in the Eastern District of Wisconsin and

Southern District of Illinois The United States District Court for the Southern District of Illinois (in case citations, S.D. Ill.) is a federal district court covering approximately the southern third of the state of Illinois. Appeals from the Southern District of Illinois ...

. From 2009 to 2014 she served solely in the Eastern District of Wisconsin and from 2010 to 2014 she served as chief United States bankruptcy judge.

Federal judicial service

In 2014, Pepper was one of three finalists recommended to President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

by the bipartisan Wisconsin Federal Nominating Commission to fill a vacancy on the federal District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin. The other finalists were attorney Beth Kushner and state-court judge

William Pocan William S. Pocan Jr. (born 1961) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as deputy chief judge of the 1st district of Wisconsin circuit courts. He has served as a Wisconsin circuit court judge in Milwaukee County since 2006. In 2021, he was nomi ...

.Gayle Worland
Three nominees for Eastern District Court judgeship named
''Wisconsin State Journal'' (February 15, 2014). On May 1, 2014, Obama nominated Pepper to the seat, which was vacated by Judge Charles N. Clevert Jr., who assumed

senior status Senior status is a form of semi-retirement for United States federal judges. To qualify, a judge in the Federal judiciary of the United States, federal court system must be at least 65 years old, and the sum of the judge's age and years of servi ...

on October 31, 2012. She received a hearing on her nomination in the

Senate Judiciary Committee The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, informally the Senate Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of 22 U.S. senators whose role is to oversee the Department of Justice (DOJ), consider executive and judicial nominations, a ...

on June 24, 2014. On July 17, 2014, her nomination was reported out of committee by a

voice vote In parliamentary procedure, a voice vote (from the Latin ''viva voce'', meaning "live voice") or acclamation is a voting method in deliberative assemblies (such as legislatures) in which a group vote is taken on a topic or motion by responding vo ...

. On November 18, 2014, Senate Majority Leader

Harry Reid Harry Mason Reid Jr. (; December 2, 1939 – December 28, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as a United States senator from Nevada from 1987 to 2017. He led the Senate Democratic Caucus from 2005 to 2017 and was the Sena ...

filed for

cloture Cloture (, also ), closure or, informally, a guillotine, is a motion or process in parliamentary procedure aimed at bringing debate to a quick end. The cloture procedure originated in the French National Assembly, from which the name is taken. ...

on her nomination. On November 19, 2014,

was invoked by a 58–39 vote. On November 20, 2014, the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

voted 95–0 to confirm her nomination. She received her judicial commission on December 8, 2014. She became chief judge on November 1, 2019.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Pepper, Pamela 1964 births Living people American women lawyers Assistant United States Attorneys Cornell Law School alumni Illinois lawyers Judges of the United States bankruptcy courts Judges of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin Marquette University alumni Northwestern University alumni Lawyers from New Orleans United States district court judges appointed by Barack Obama 21st-century American judges Wisconsin lawyers 21st-century American women judges