Carlton Wayne Reeves

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American judge (born 1964)

Carlton Wayne Reeves (born April 11, 1964) is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi and chair of the United States Sentencing Commission .

Reeves was the district court judge in _Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization _ (2022), the case that resulted in the Supreme Court overturning _Roe v. Wade _ (1973).

Early life and education

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Reeves was born in 1964 in Fort Hood, Texas , and was raised in rural Yazoo City, Mississippi . Reeves was one of seven children, with three sisters and three brothers.

Reeves was a student in the first integrated public-school class in Mississippi. As a teenager, Reeves cleaned the office of Judge William H. Barbour Jr. , whom he would later replace on the federal bench. Reeves was the first person in his family to attend a four-year college, and graduated in 1986 _magna cum laude _ from Jackson State University . Reeves then attended the University of Virginia School of Law , graduating in 1989 as a Ritter Scholar. After law school, Reeves served as a law clerk for Justice Reuben V. Anderson , the first African American judge to serve on the Mississippi Supreme Court .

Career

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Reeves began his legal career in 1991 as a staff attorney for the Supreme Court of Mississippi; later that year, he entered private practice as an associate at the Jackson, Mississippi office of regional law firm Phelps Dunbar. From 1995 to 2001, Reeves served as Chief of the Civil Division for the Office of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi. In 2001, Reeves returned to private practice to found his own firm, Pigott Reeves Johnson, in Jackson. During his time in private practice, Reeves served on the boards of a number of civic organizations, including the ACLU of Mississippi, the Mississippi Center for Justice, and the Magnolia Bar Association .

Federal judicial service

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On April 28, 2010, Reeves was nominated by President Barack Obama to fill a seat on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi vacated by Judge William H. Barbour Jr.

Reeves was confirmed by the United States Senate on December 19, 2010, by voice vote . Reeves is the second African American to serve on the federal judiciary in Mississippi . He received his commission on December 20, 2010.

Notable decisions

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Campaign for Southern Equality v. Bryant

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Main article: Same-sex marriage in Mississippi

On November 25, 2014, Reeves ruled in the case of _Campaign for Southern Equality v. Bryant _ that Mississippi’s same-sex marriage ban violated the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment . Reeves' opinion noted the connection between racism and homophobia, and how that connection had long operated to oppress both black and LGBT Mississippians. Reeves held that, just as the state's views on race had led it to oppress blacks for generations, "Mississippi’s traditional beliefs about gay and lesbian citizens ... [took] away fundamental rights owed to every citizen. It is time to restore those rights."

United States v. Butler

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Main article: Murder of James Craig Anderson

On February 10, 2015, Reeves sentenced three young white men for their roles in the death of a 48-year-old black man named James Craig Anderson. They were part of a group that beat Anderson and then killed him by running over his body with a truck, yelling "white power" as they drove off. In handing down sentences of between 7 and 50 years in prison for the defendants, Reeves gave a widely publicized speech that remarked on how the killing of Anderson fit into Mississippi's "tortured past" of lynchings and racism. While noting that the defendants had "ripped off the scab of the healing scars of Mississippi," Reeves asserted that the integrated, race-neutral operation of Mississippi's modern-day justice system was "the strongest way" for the state to reject the racism of the past.

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Campaign for Southern Equality v. Bryant

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Main article: Same-sex marriage in Mississippi

On November 25, 2014, Reeves ruled in the case of _Campaign for Southern Equality v. Bryant _ that Mississippi’s same-sex marriage ban violated the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment . Reeves' opinion noted the connection between racism and homophobia, and how that connection had long operated to oppress both black and LGBT Mississippians. …