Tennessee Supreme Court Chief Justice William M. Barker will retire at noon Sept. 1 after a 25-year judicial career, according to a statement from the Administrative Office of the Courts.
“It has been a great honor to serve the first twelve years as a circuit judge in Chattanooga, followed by three years on the Court of Criminal Appeals, and the last ten as a member of our State Supreme Court,” Justice Barker wrote in a letter to Gov. Phil Bredesen. “It has been my highest professional honor to have been chosen by my colleagues to serve as chief justice these past three years.”
Justice William Barker, 66, is a Chattanooga native who earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Chattanooga and his law degree from the University Of Cincinnati School Of Law. In 1995, Gov. Don Sundquist appointed him to the state Court of Criminal Appeals. The next year Justice Barger was elected to an eight-year term.
He was appointed to the Tennessee Supreme Court in 1998 and elected to a full eight-year term the same year and again in 2006. His court colleagues unanimously elected him chief justice in 2005.
In his letter to Gov. Bredesen, Justice Barker said he has “seen countless positive changes in both substantive and procedural laws” while serving as a judge.
“I am pleased to report that the state of the judiciary in Tennessee is excellent,” he wrote.---from Chattanooga Times Free-Press
Pictured in the courtroom at the Supreme Court Building in Nashville are (seated) Chief Justice William M. Barker and (standing left to right) Justices Gary R. Wade, Janice M. Holder, Cornelia A. Clark, and William C. Koch, Jr.
Carolyn Thomas Presswood reminds us Justice Barker is our 1959 graduating class classmate, Mickey.
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