In Memoriam: Remembering Notable Federal Judges Who Died In 2023

The death of Sandra Day O’Connor, the nation’s first female US Supreme Court justice, drew big headlines, but about three dozen other federal judges across the country also have died in 2023.

Bloomberg Law highlights six particularly notable lower court judges who died, including those with historically significant tenures on the bench.

Marcia Cooke

Marcia G. Cooke, the first Black woman to serve as a federal judge in Florida, died on Jan. 27 at 68, following nearly two decades on the bench. The George W. Bush appointee was confirmed to the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida in 2004, and took senior status, a form of semi-retirement, in 2022.

Before taking the bench, she worked as a public defender and as a prosecutor, and served as a US magistrate judge for the Eastern District of Michigan. She also was chief inspector general for the executive office of then-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) and an assistant county attorney for Miami-Dade.

Cooke oversaw the terrorism conspiracy trial and sentencing of Jose Padilla, who spent years in a military prison after being one of the first American citizens to be designated as an “enemy combatant” following 9/11.

Maryanne Trump Barry

Maryanne Trump Barry, the sister of former President Donald Trump who served on the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, died in November.

Barry, 86, was nominated by Ronald Reagan to the District of New Jersey, where she spent 16 years. She was confirmed to the Third Circuit in 1999 following her nomination by Bill Clinton. Before joining the bench, she spent nearly a decade as an assistant US attorney in New Jersey.

Barry took senior status in 2011, but later resigned in 2019 amid scrutiny into the Trump family’s tax dealings and a court investigation into the issue.

A notable opinion included a 2006 decision where she excoriated an immigration judge for “bullying” a Gambian asylum-seeker and called for the case to be heard by a different judge on remand; that judge was removed from hearing cases the same year.

James Buckley

James L. Buckley, who served nearly 40 years on the DC Circuit, died Aug 18. The Reagan appointee, who was 100, took senior status in 1996.

Before joining the bench, Buckley served a term in the US Senate representing New York from 1971 to 1977, after winning as a third-party candidate. He later served as the State Department’s undersecretary for security assistance and president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty during the Reagan administration. He was one of the few people in modern history to have served in all three branches of government.

Buckley’s brother, the late William F. Buckley Jr., founded the conservative magazine, the National Review.

H. Lee Sarokin

H. Lee Sarokin, a former Third Circuit judge known for his sharp language in rulings against tobacco companies, died in June. Sarokin, 94, was appointed by Jimmy Carter to the New Jersey federal trial court in 1979. Fifteen years later, he joined the Third Circuit following his nomination by Clinton. He served on that court until his retirement in 1996.

As a trial judge, Sarokin delivered the first damage award against a cigarette company to the family of a smoker who died of lung cancer. The Third Circuit, which reversed the award, later removed Sarokin from hearing tobacco cases after finding his language in opinions showed bias against tobacco companies.

During his Senate confirmation hearing in 1994, Sarokin admitted his language was “maybe unduly strong.” But in a 2016 letter to the New York Times, Sarokin wrote he now wishes “to retract that concession and declare that it wasn’t harsh enough.”

Gladys Kessler

Gladys Kessler, a former federal judge who served for 23 years on the Washington federal trial court, died on March 16. She was appointed to that court by Clinton in 1994, and earlier was tapped by Carter to the DC Superior Court. Kessler, who was 85 when she died, took senior status in 2007 and retired a decade later.

Her notable rulings included an over 1,652 page opinion finding tobacco companies violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) in hiding the true damaging effects of smoking, and ordering them to place warnings about adverse health effects and addictiveness of smoking.

Kessler “was a pioneer in the women’s movement, a compassionate and brilliant jurist, a wise mentor to her colleagues, and a good friend,” then-Chief Judge Beryl Howell of the DC District Court said in a statement.

Ronald S.W. Lew

A senior judge on the Central District of California, Lew died on May 19.

Appointed by Reagan in 1987, Lew was the first Chinese-American federal judge outside of Hawaii. He was active within the Chinese American community, helping to found the Southern California Chinese Lawyers Association in 1975 and helping to stand up the non-profit Chinatown Service Center in Los Angeles that same decade, according to a court announcement.

Before being appointed to the federal court, Lew, who was 81 when he died, served on the Los Angeles Municipal Court and the Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Among the people he mentored was US District Judge Dolly Gee, who also serves on the Los Angeles-based federal trial court. Gee, in a statement, called Lew “a pillar in the Los Angeles legal community, and especially in the Chinese American community.”