Judge Bios

Judge Kennedy was born on February 22, 1948, in Columbia, South Carolina, and

has been a resident of the District of Columbia for the past forty years. A graduate of Calvin

Coolidge High School, Judge Kennedy pursued his undergraduate studies at Princeton

University where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree having completed an

undergraduate course of study in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International

Affairs. Judge Kennedy eared his Juris Doctorate at the Harvard Law School.

Following his graduation from law school, Judge Kennedy was associated with the

law firm of Jones Day Reavis and Pogue and, thereafter, served as an Assistant United

States Attorney for the District of Columbia. On April 21, 1976, he was appointed United

States Magistrate for the District of Columbia by the Judges of the United States District

Court. The Honorable Oliver Gasch chaired the District Court’s Magistrates Committee.

Judge Kennedy was appointed to the Superior Court by President Jimmy Carter.

During his tenure on the Superior Court, Judge Kennedy served in various divisions of the

Court. He was the first judge to preside over an expedited, high volume, non-jury

misdemeanor trial calendar and was one of the first judges to preside over the Superior

Court’s innovative “Drug Court.” At the time of his appointment as a United States District

Judge, Judge Kennedy presided over a Civil I calendar, a calendar devoted to the most

complex civil suits including mass tort litigation involving asbestos and lead paint. During his

service as a judge on the Superior Court, he twice sat by designation on the District of

Columbia Court of Appeals.

In addition to his service on the bench, Judge Kennedy served on a number of

Superior Court committees and assisted extensively in t administration of that Court. At the

time of his appointment to the United States District Court, Judge Kennedy chaired the

Committee on the Selection and Tenure of Hearing Commissioners, a committee he

chaired for nine years, and was a member of the Criminal Rules Advisory Committee and

the Liaison Committee with the District of Columbia Commission on Judicial Disabilities and

Tenure. He was Deputy Presiding Judge of the Criminal Division for four years, from 1990-

1994. He also served on the District of Columbia Courts’ Task Force on Racial and Gender

Bias in the Courts, chairing the Subcommittee on Court Administration, and on the

committee of judges and lawyers that drafted the District of Columbia Child Support

Guidelines, the foundation of the District of Columbia’s current child support law.

Judge Kennedy also has been active in various Bar and law related activities,

including the American Bar Association’s Task Force on “Training the Advocate” and its

Criminal Justice Standards Committee. He is a member of the American Law Institute, a

Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Einstein

Institute for Science, Health and the Courts, a non-profit education and research corporation.

In the community, Judge Kennedy has devoted substantial time and effort to

several activities geared toward assisting in the development of young District of Columbia

residents. He has been a mentor and has been active in various activities of the

Washington Tennis Foundation, serving as that organization’s President in 1983 and 1984

and, currently, as member of its Board of Directors. He serves on the Alumni Schools

Committee of the Princeton Club of Washington, concentrating his efforts on the recruitment

of public high school students and then guiding applicants through the admission process.

Judge Kennedy has received several awards, most recently the 1997 H. Carl

Moultrie I Award for Judicial Excellence, presented by the Trial Lawyers Association of

Washington, D.C.

The Judge is married to Altomease Rucker Kennedy and they live in northwest

Washington, D.C. with their daughters Morgan and Alexandra.

the Washington Tennis Foundation, serving as that organization’s President in 1983 and

1984 and, currently, as member of its Board of Directors. He serves on the Alumni Schools

Committee of the Princeton Club of Washington, concentrating his efforts on the recruitment

of public high school students and then guiding applicants through the admission process.

Judge Kennedy has received several awards, most recently the 1997 H. Carl

Moultrie I Award for Judicial Excellence, presented by the Trial Lawyers Association of

Washington, D.C.

The Judge is married to Altomease Rucker Kennedy and they live in northwest

Washington, D.C. with their daughters Morgan and Alexandra.