Panel upholds US judge's private reprimand for affair with police officer

Nate Raymond

May 26, 20269:24 AM CDTUpdated 20 hours ago

Illustration shows U.S. flag, a judge gavel and a vintage scale

The U.S. flag, a judge gavel and a vintage scale are seen in this illustration taken August 6, 2024. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights

May 26 (Reuters) - A national judicial panel has ​upheld a private reprimand of a federal judge in the U.S. South who engaged in an ‌extramarital affair with a high-ranking police officer and had sexual intercourse in the judge's chambers within earshot of staff.

The U.S. Judicial Conference's Committee on Judicial Conduct and Disability on Friday approved the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit Judicial Council's February decision on how to discipline the judge, whose name and court ​location were not disclosed publicly.

Jumpstart your morning with the latest legal news delivered straight to your inbox from The Daily Docket newsletter. Sign up here.

Besides the private reprimand, the judge had also agreed to apologize to former ​law clerks interviewed in the probe; forego the chance to serve as chief judge; and ⁠indefinitely refrain from serving on any Judicial Conference committees.

The seven-member Judicial Conference panel called the discipline "appropriate and proportionate" for ​the judge, who sits in a region that includes Alabama, Florida and Georgia.

While the 11th Circuit said an investigative panel ​had been "deeply troubled" by the judge's conduct, it had opted against a more severe sanction because the judge "demonstrated a strong propensity for rehabilitation and continued diligent service to the judiciary."

The allegations were first reported last year by a law clerk working for the district court judge, ​who reported that the judge had on multiple occasions engaged in sexual activity with a uniformed police officer in ​the judge’s office during work hours.

The clerk, who was later reassigned a new position, also alleged that the judge had yelled and ‌cursed at ⁠staff and once told staff members that the judge "had too many martinis the night before" at an event for a district attorney.

After the unnamed judge initially denied the allegations when first confronted by Chief U.S. Circuit Judge William Pryor in September 2025, Pryor appointed a special committee to investigate.

The investigation found that the judge engaged in an extramarital affair, attended ​a political campaign event for ​the district attorney and ⁠made false statements when the judge denounced the claims as "baseless" and "outrageous."

While the unnamed judge had initially denied the claims, the judge through a lawyer in October 2025 recanted and admitted ​to the affair, which had been going on for about two years.

The officer's police ​department during the ⁠time of the undisclosed affair was involved in numerous criminal and civil cases. While the judge was not assigned any cases in which the officer or the police department was a party or a witness, the investigative panel found that was due ⁠to "happenstance."

As ​for the political events, the investigative committee found the judge knowingly attended ​an event hosted by a district attorney’s campaign.

While the judge did so for the purpose of reuniting with former colleagues, the 11th Circuit said judges ​under the Judicial Code of Conduct must refrain from attending events organized by political candidates.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49903671)

not an 11th circuit judge. a districttt judge. lol @ op

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904090)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embry_Kidd

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49903677)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Britt_Grant

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49903675)

Looks like a sororstitute who absolutely SCREAMS while getting railed.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904098)

would love to see her Melvin cuck husband

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904829)

--

Grant was born Elizabeth Britt Cagle[1] in Atlanta, Georgia. Grant attended high school at The Westminster Schools. She studied English literature and politics at Wake Forest University, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts, summa cum laude, in 2000.[2]

From 2000 to 2004, Grant worked for then-Congressman Nathan Deal in Washington, D.C., and served in various roles in the administration of President George W. Bush.[2] She then attended Stanford Law School, where she was a managing editor of the Stanford Journal of International Law and a senior articles editor of the Stanford Law and Policy Review. Grant also served as president of the school's Federalist Society chapter. She graduated with a Juris Doctor with distinction in 2007.

Grant was a law clerk to then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 2007 to 2008.[3][4] From 2008 to 2012, Grant was in private practice at the law firm Kirkland & Ellis. From 2012 to 2014, she was an attorney for legal policy in the Office of the Georgia Attorney General.[1]

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49906933)

It also included “conducting testing in a chamber with a similar layout to determine whether law clerks seated outside chambers could hear sounds from within; arranging forensic testing of a couch cushion in the subject judge’s chambers,” the decision said.

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/26/us-judge-courts-sex-police-disciplinary.html

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49903737)

here they even protect the judge's name.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904193)

Volokh dot com with the autistic scholarship

Who Is The District Court Judge Who Was Privately Reprimanded For Having Loud Sex In Her Chambers With A Law Enforcement Officer From Her District?

The clues in the memorandum point to a specific judge.

Josh Blackman | 5.27.2026 5:00 PM

On February 11, the Judicial Council of the Eleventh Circuit published an order with remarkable conclusions: a federal district court judge somewhere in the Eleventh Circuit "engag[ed] in an extramarital affair with a law enforcement officer and, in the course of the affair, having sexual intercourse in the Subject Judge's office during work hours and within hearing distance of the judge's clerks." Ultimately, however, the Council issues a private reprimand, rather than a public reprimand. The identity of the judge is not disclosed. But many of the clues in the memorandum point to a particular judge.

First, we can easily narrow down which of the three states in the Eleventh Circuit is at issue. The order refers to a "victory party for a District Attorney" in 2024 the night before "the judge's summer interns' first day." Florida does not have District Attorneys; they are called State Attorneys. So we are down to Alabama and Georgia. In 2024, the Alabama primary was on March 4 and the primary runoff was on April 16. Those dates don't match with when a summer intern would start. In Georgia, the primary was on May 21, 2024. That date matches up well with the start of a summer internship.

Second, the memorandum indicates that the subject judge is not currently the Chief Judge of the District. The memorandum further states that the chambers of the chief judge are "configured almost identically to the Subject Judge's chambers," which suggests the chief judge and the subject judge are in the same building. Georgia is divided into a Northern District, a Middle District, and a Southern District. The Chief Judge of the Southern District is stationed in Savannah. He appears to be the only active status judge stationed in that building. The Chief Judge of the Middle District is stationed in Albany. No other active status judges are stationed in Albany. As best as I can tell, all of the active Northern District Judges have chambers in the Richard B. Russell building in Atlanta. (I visited that high-rise tower in 2008 when I interviewed with Jack Camp, another disgraced NDGA judge.) And it would stand to reason that chambers on different floors would have similar layouts. It seems very likely that the subject judge is stationed in Atlanta.

Third, the reprimand states that this judge would "forego service as chief judge should the Subject Judge be otherwise eligible to serve in that cap." The current chief judge's tenure will expire, at the latest, in May 2032. There are several active duty judges in the Northern District of Georgia who could, in theory, be eligible to become chief judge in 2032. But that list is fairly small.

Fourth, there was a very high profile District Attorney race in Atlanta that was settled on May 21, 2024: Fani Willis won the Democratic primary for the Fulton County District Attorney. Yes, Fani Willis is the prosecutor who indicted Donald Trump and his associates for alleged election interference. There were many press reports about Willis's victory in the 2024 Democratic primary. The memorandum makes several references to martinis. For example, "the Subject Judge explained that the judge had consumed too many martinis the night before at the primary election victory party for a District Attorney." Moreover, "Based on news coverage, including video and photos, the District Attorney's campaign held an election watch party at which drinks or food in martini glasses appeared to have been served." Well, there were certainly martinis at Willis's party. Here is a photo of Nathan Wade at Willis's victory party from Fox 5 Atlanta. In the background you can see a martini glass. For those who do not recall, Wade resigned as special prosecutor in the Trump case after admitting to having an affair with Willis.

If you watch the video of her celebration, you can see martini glasses on the waiter's tray.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution has another photo of a woman next to Wade holding a martini. The AP has many more.

Fifth, the memorandum states that the "Subject Judge acknowledged having been friends with a District Attorney since 1999." The judge also had "former district attorney's office colleagues" at the victory party. The memorandum further relays, "The Subject Judge stated that, on one occasion, at the District Attorney's invitation, the judge went to a 'mixer' of former employees of a District Attorney's Office—where the Subject Judge previously worked."

The reprimand also disqualified the judge from being chief judge, which would rule out any senior status judges or judges who have already aged out of being chief judge. How many judges of the Northern District of Georgia in Atlanta could have plausibly been friends with Fani Willis since 1999, worked in the Fulton County District Attorney's Office, and could still be in line to be chief judge? There is only one judge who checks all of those boxes: District Court Judge Eleanor Ross.

Let's start with her background. From 1998 to 2002, she served as a senior assistant district attorney in Fulton County, Georgia. That would have given her a chance to work with Fani Willis, who was an assistant district attorney during that time. After a stint in the U.S. Attorney's office, Ross returned to Fulton County as an Executive Assistant District Attorney. She was appointed to the state bench in 2011, and President Obama nominated her for the federal bench in 2014. It stands to reason that she would still be in touch with her former prosecutor colleagues from about 15 years ago. I checked the biographies of the other active duty judges in NDGA, and none served in the Fulton County District Attorney's Office.

District Court Judge Eleanor Ross was born in December 1967. She is next in line to be Chief Judge based on seniority. (There is one judge ahead of her who has been on the bench longer, but he has already aged out.) In May 2032, Ross will be short of 65 years old, and would be eligible to become Chief Judge.

The memorandum further states that on the day after the DA's victory party, "Subject Judge presided over a criminal revocation proceeding." Indeed, Judge Ross presided over a revocation of supervised release on May 22, 2024 at 11:30 AM in 1:23-cr-350.

I cannot know for certain if Judge Ross is the subject judge, but a lot of evidence points in that direction. I emailed Judge Ross's courtroom deputy seeking a comment from the judge, but did not receive a response. I will post any response Judge Ross sends.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904548)

i still can't get over a judge lying in the investigation and keeping her job and anonymity.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49904742)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Tarpley_Camp_Jr.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49905407)

Camp was named and forced to step down off the bench?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49905422)

I do like "including a felony count for giving a stripper cocaine even though he knew she was a convicted felon." Like guns, possession of coke is only a problem if you're a felon.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49906476)

Move on and never discuss this again

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49905447)

https://x.com/chamugah/status/2060234220203561360?s=20

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49906873)

=====

Sex, Lies and Secrets: A Federal Judge’s Trysts Go Public

Now, Judge Eleanor Ross’s career and caseload are under scrutiny. And her punishment, a private reprimand, has sparked backlash.

By Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs and Mattathias Schwartz

June 11, 2026, 5:00 a.m. ET

For years, Judge Eleanor Ross’s secret was passed down from law clerk to law clerk.

They whispered about the sultry jazz music that emanated from her chambers when a uniformed police commander, a man they called her “visitor,” disappeared into her private office. The clerks could sometimes hear the unmistakable sounds of sex from behind the door.

They chalked it up as one of the burdens of working for Judge Ross, who routinely rubber stamped their draft orders and added little else before issuing them as rulings. But the clerks in the Atlanta courthouse felt helpless: Do you report your married boss, a federal judge no less, for having a clandestine in-office affair with a law enforcement officer?

One day last year, a clerk did exactly that.

The complaint triggered a months-long judicial investigation that involved courthouse interviews and the seizure of a beige office couch cushion that was tested in a lab for bodily fluid.

The ensuing investigative report is a chronicle of sex, lies and ethical breaches, much of which is cloaked in secrecy because America’s federal court system affords judges broad deference. The report, which became public last month, did not include Judge Ross’s name, gender or location. Details of the anonymous judge’s case soon rocketed through the clubby, decorous world of the judiciary.

The New York Times confirmed it was Judge Ross through interviews with three of her former clerks and two people familiar with the matter, and obtained a signed apology letter that she wrote as part of a judicial reprimand.

Now, Judge Ross is under fire from all three branches of the federal government. Some Republican members of Congress are calling for her impeachment. The Justice Department is urging her to recuse herself from a high-profile election integrity case. Some of her fellow judges say the punishment she received has been too lenient. And the Atlanta Police Department says it is investigating the accusations involving one of its top-ranking officers.

Judge Ross’s conduct “strikes at the heart of judicial integrity,” said Aliza Shatzman, an attorney who runs the Legal Accountability Project, a nonprofit group that advocates for court clerks. “It harms public trust in the federal courts to see this type of misconduct not taken seriously.”

Judge Ross, who was nominated to the bench in 2014 by President Barack Obama, did not respond to requests for comment. Chief Judge William H. Pryor Jr., of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, which handed down her punishment, declined to comment.

The 20-page report from a judicial committee documented Judge Ross’s yearslong affair with a high-ranking police officer. It also concluded that she had improperly attended a campaign event for an unnamed district attorney. Details outlined in the investigation, as well as two people familiar with the matter, identified her as Fani Willis, the Fulton County district attorney.

The committee also found that Judge Ross had initially lied to her fellow judges by blaming the clerk who reported her misconduct, suggesting that he was retaliating against her by making “outrageous” and “baseless” claims.

The findings sparked scorn in the legal world, but it was, perhaps, the punishment she received — a private reprimand and an agreement to not be promoted to chief judge of her district court — that drew even more ire. It sparked questions of accountability in the justice system and concerns that federal judges with lifetime appointments can misbehave with little consequence, all while doling out serious sanctions to those who appear before them.

Jeremy Fogel, a retired federal judge who consults with judges on ethics questions, said some in the judiciary disagreed with how Judge Ross’s case had been resolved. “Many of the sitting judges with whom I’ve spoken believe the findings as a whole warranted a more significant sanction,” he said.

The judicial committee cited Judge Ross’s “otherwise exemplary service” in issuing her a private reprimand, which meant that her identity was supposed to remain a secret. In general, judges rarely face serious punishment.

Other federal judges have committed serious offenses and received private reprimands. They include one who pursued a relationship with an assistant who then accused him of sexual harassment, one who made an antisemitic remark during a trial, and another who harassed a Black salesman passing through her neighborhood. All of those offending judges remained on the bench and their identities were never disclosed.

In fact, only three out of 1,857 complaints against federal judges last year were referred to a special committee for examination, including Judge Ross’s.

In her case, the judicial committee wrote that her on-the-clock sexual liaisons had “cast a pall” on the workplace and left her open to being blackmailed. She eventually admitted the affair to the committee, saying it had run from roughly late 2022 to sometime around the fall of 2025.

Three of Judge Ross’s former clerks, each of whom were interviewed by investigators, spoke with The Times on the condition of anonymity, fearing reprisal.

The accounts reveal how the once-respected jurist began to falter, making errors in judgment and distressing the employees whom she and other judges depended on the most: clerks.

Judge Ross spent years prosecuting crime in Atlanta before she became a state court judge. She received Mr. Obama’s nomination after two and a half years on the local bench, and also won the endorsement of Georgia’s two senators, both of whom were Republicans.

Judge Ross emphasized her principles during the confirmation process.

“The most important attribute of a judge is integrity,” she wrote. Her husband, a lawyer who is now a Georgia state court judge, sat behind her during her confirmation hearing.

She soon settled on the 17th floor of the federal courthouse, in an office with two couches, a meeting table and windows that overlooked the Atlanta Falcons’ stadium.

Among the décor in her chambers was a picture of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg with a quote from a Beyoncé and Drake song overlaid: “All them fives need to listen when a ten is talking.” Elsewhere, she hung an apology letter from a lawyer she had chastised for being underdressed and underprepared in court.

In their first year of the prestigious two-year clerkship, Judge Ross’s clerks would sit at a desk just feet away from the door to her office. In addition to their legal work, they were tasked with greeting visitors, and they kept a small CCTV screen nearby to see who was outside.

So it was odd when they would see a uniformed police officer walk down the hallway toward the back door of Judge Ross’s office.

The walls were thin, and the clerks could sometimes hear music and the judge and officer chatting. Then the music would continue, and the talking would stop. Other times, what they heard was more explicit.

The three clerks told The Times that their stomachs churned when they realized what was taking place. But, coupled with her other actions, it also represented something fundamentally painful to them: that a person with a role they revered, a person whose job it was to decide America’s laws, seemed not to care the way they cared.

One clerk said it felt like their belief in the legal system had been yanked out from underneath their feet, and that they wondered whether to continue working in law.

While the clerks said they might have been willing to overlook isolated personal foibles, they were more broadly disturbed by the lack of attention Judge Ross paid to the civil disputes that came before her.

While Judge Ross was engaged on her criminal cases, the clerks — often fresh out of law school — told investigators that she largely let them decide how to rule on key motions in lawsuits. It was not unusual to go weeks without hearing much from her except for a brief email — “Please docket.” — a few minutes after they sent her a draft order, three clerks told The Times.

They estimated that she provided edits on roughly 5 percent of the civil orders that they drafted in her name, and even then mostly just for grammar or typos.

Judge Ross later disputed the clerks’ account to the judicial committee, saying that she made edits to 30 to 40 percent of drafts.

Ultimately, the committee required the judge to send apology letters to the six law clerks who spoke to investigators.

The committee said the letters “should be sufficiently specific so as to make clear to the recipient the sexual misconduct for which the judge is apologizing.”

The letters she sent, dated May 27, were three sentences long and identical.

“Thank you for your contributions to our court during your clerkship,” Judge Ross wrote, according to a copy obtained by The Times. “I convey my deepest apology for not taking steps to ensure that it was a more positive experience. I wish you all the best in your future legal endeavors and in life.”

The apology letter that Judge Eleanor Ross sent to clerks.

The letters that Judge Ross sent, dated May 27, were three sentences long and identical.

The three former clerks who spoke to The Times said that they viewed the letter as offensively vague. One decided to share it with the chief judge of the 11th Circuit, believing it didn’t comply with the committee’s order.

Judge Timothy C. Batten, Judge Ross’s former colleague in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, worried that her misconduct would affect how courts and judges were viewed by the public.

“I’m really sorry this happened and reflects poorly on the court,” he said in an interview. Judge Batten retired last year as chief judge of the district court and said he had never gotten wind of Judge Ross’s misconduct.

Now, some in the Atlanta legal world wonder if Judge Ross’s career will survive.

“I don’t know where you go from here,” said Don Samuel, a criminal defense lawyer in Atlanta who has long known, and respected, Judge Ross.

“There’s so much snickering going on by everybody that I can’t imagine what it will be like to be on the bench and wonder what everybody’s thinking,” he said.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931576)

[two minutes pass]

judge's email: "Please docket"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931585)

wow NYT is going after a black judge like this

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931589)

====

They [the clerks] estimated that she provided edits on roughly 5 percent of the civil orders that they drafted in her name, and even then mostly just for grammar or typos.

Judge Ross later disputed the clerks’ account to the judicial committee, saying that she made edits to 30 to 40 percent of drafts.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931601)

=====

Jason

Chicago, IL ·

7h ago

I'm struggling to understand what the actual scandal is here.

Is it that she had an affair? That she had an affair with a police officer? That the affair took place in her office? That some of her clerks believed she was ineffective at her job? Or that she initially denied the affair?

Why is she being held to a higher standard than a President, Senator, Congressman, or Supreme Court Justice? History is full of male politicians, judges, and other public officials who engaged in workplace affairs, often with the expectation that everyone involved would be discreet about it.

Yet when a woman behaves in a similar manner, the reaction seems to be far more severe, as though it's time to bring back the scarlet letter.

Unless there is evidence that her conduct affected her judicial decisions, involved corruption, or constituted an abuse of power, this hardly seems like a matter worthy of a major investigation.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931630)

lying in the course of an official investigation immediately ends a lawyer's career. judges are supposed to be held to an even higher standard.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931881)

But the judiciary and other puritans have agreed that it is an offense, and it was violated, so the only question is regarding punishment.

There’s tons of unbelievably gay bullshit lawyers have to do and rules to follow where technica violations are punished and you can’t tell the attorney misconduct committee of your state that it’s NBD.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931798)

more color please

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49931614)

lover was also black

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5869426&forum_id=2],#49932001)