The first Black woman to serve on the federal bench in Louisiana was honored at a formal investiture ceremony Thursday.
The ceremony was held for Nannette Jolivette Brown at the Hale Boggs Federal Court Building. Brown was nominated by President Barack Obama in March and confirmed by the U.S. Senate last October. U.S. Mary Landrieu, D-La., recommended Brown for the federal bench.
“Today we celebrated history by officially swearing in the first African-American woman to the federal bench in Louisiana,” U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said. Thursday. Landrieu praised Brown for possessing “a wealth of knowledge and legal expertise” and being “well-suited to serve the public interest.”
Judge Jolivette Brown,
born November 19, 1963, will fill the seat of Judge Stanwood Duval, who has taken senior status.
Prior to her appointment to the United States District Court, Judge Jolivette Brown was City Attorney for the City of New Orleans, where she was the city’s chief legal officer, managing and directing 75 staff attorneys and a number of outside law firms in addressing all matters impacting the city of New Orleans. Between 2004 and 2007 and again from 2009 until 2010, she was a Special Partner with the firm of Chaffe McCall, LLP. She had a varied practice in commercial and environmental litigation as well as in real estate law and other transactional matters.
From 2000 to2003, Jolivette Brown was an equity partner with Milling Benson Woodward law firm where she headed the Energy and Environmental Law section of the firm. From 1996 to 1998 she practiced law with the Onebane Law Firm in Lafayette, Louisiana, where her practice involved environmental and commercial litigation. From 1988 to 1992, Jolivette Brown practiced commercial and environmental litigation at the firm of Adams & Reese, LLP. While practicing law with private law firms, she always allotted time to represent those unable to afford representation at no cost or at significantly reduced rates.
In addition to practicing law, Jolivette Brown has taught at three of the four law schools in Louisiana. She was a Teaching Fellow from 1992 until 1994 at Tulane Law School’s Environmental Law Clinic where, through a clinical teaching program, she taught students while representing environmental organizations as well as poor, disadvantaged communities in litigation initiated throughout the State of Louisiana and in permitting matters before the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.
In the mid-1990s she was an Assistant Professor of Law at Southern University Law Center, where among other subjects, she taught Federal Civil Procedure, Professional Responsibility, Legal Research and Writing, and Environmental and Toxic Tort Law. From 2007 to 2009, as a Visiting Professor of Law, she helped establish the Loyola Law School Mediation Clinic where she provided free mediation services to those unable to pursue traditional legal avenues to resolve their disputes. She previously served as an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School, where she taught Evidence for Trial.
Judge Jolivette Brown is the former director of the New Orleans Sanitation Department where she established the city’s first curbside recycling program and initiated the city’s compliance with RCRA and CERCLA regulations. After Hurricane Katrina, Jolivette Brown was selected by the Louisiana Department of Insurance and the American Arbitration Association to mediate hundreds of insurance-related disputes in a program established for that purpose.
Among the many honors Judge Jolivette Brown has received over the years are the Louisiana Association of Black Women Attorneys’ Trailblazer Award; New Orleans Magazine’s People to Watch Award in 2010, having previously received the award in 1995; Louisiana Jaycee’s Outstanding Young Women’s Award; 1994 Black Achiever in Business Award; and Tulane Law School’s Distinguished Minority Graduate Award. She graduated from Tulane Law School with a J.D. in 1988 and a LL.M. in Energy and Environmental Law in 1998. She received a B.A. in English Journalism from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in 1985.
Nannette Jolivette Brown is married to Marcus V. Brown. They have two children, Christopher, 19, and Rachel, 18.
This article was originally published in the January 23, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper
Source...Louisiana Weekly... Jan 23, 2012
