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Chief Justice Bridget Mary McCormack joined the Michigan
Supreme Court in January 2013, and became Chief Justice in January 2019.
Before her
election to the Court in November 2012, she was a law professor and dean at the
University of Michigan Law School. Since
joining the Court, Chief Justice McCormack continues to teach at the Law
School.
Chief Justice
McCormack is a graduate of the New York University Law School, where she was a
Root-Tilden scholar and won the Anne Petluck Poses Prize in Clinical
Advocacy. She spent the first five years
of her legal career in New York, first with the Legal Aid Society and then at
the Office of the Appellate Defender. In
1996, she became a faculty fellow at the Yale Law School.
In 1998, she
joined the University of Michigan Law School faculty. At Michigan Law, she taught criminal law,
legal ethics, and various clinical courses. Her scholarship focused on the professional
benefits of clinical legal education.
She also created new clinics at the law school, including a Domestic
Violence Clinic and a Pediatric Health Advocacy Clinic.
In 2002, she
was named Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs.
Responsible for the continuing development of the law school’s practical
education, she continued to expand the clinical offerings at Michigan Law
School, launching a Mediation Clinic, a Low Income Taxpayer Clinic, an
International Transactions Clinic, a Human Trafficking Clinic, a Juvenile
Justice Clinic, and an Entrepreneurship Clinic.
In her capacity as professor and associate dean, she conducted and
supervised many types of civil and criminal litigation at all levels of the
state and federal courts. The University
of Michigan Law School’s clinical programs are now recognized nationally as one
of the best places to be trained as a lawyer.
In 2008,
then-Associate Dean McCormack cofounded the Michigan Innocence Clinic, in which
students represent wrongfully convicted Michiganders. The clinic has exonerated over 15 people so
far, and has shined a light on the important justice issues underlying wrongful
conviction. In 2010, McCormack won the
“Justice for All” Award for the Clinic’s work, and in 2011 the Washtenaw County
Bar Association gave her the “Patriot Award.”
In 2012, she won the Cooley Law School’s “Distinguished Brief Award” for
the best brief filed in the Michigan Supreme Court during the term. Also in 2012, the Justice Caucus presented
her with the Millie Jeffrey Award and the Washtenaw County Women Lawyers recognized
her with the Mary Foster Award. In 2013,
Chief Justice McCormack was honored with the Hon. Kaye Tertzag Purple Sport
Coat Award. The American-Arab
Anti-Discrimination Committee recognized her with its Guardian of Justice Award
in 2014. She accepted the Impact Award
from the Washtenaw County Dispute Resolution Center in 2017. In 2018, the Michigan Association for Justice
honored Chief Justice McCormack with its Judicial Excellence Award.
Chief Justice
McCormack participates with a number of professional organizations including
the American Bar Association Access to Justice committee, the American Bar
Association Litigation Journal's Board of Editors (and is an Associate Editor
for Litigation Magazine), the advisory board of the Michigan Civil Rights
Academy, the Board of the Washtenaw County Chapter of Families Against
Narcotics, and as a board member of the National Board of Legal Specialty
Certification. In 2013, Chief Justice
McCormack was elected to The American Law Institute. In 2014, Chief Justice McCormack was
appointed by the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of
Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology to a newly-created
National Commission on Forensic Science. In 2018, Chief Justice McCormack
became a member of the University Musical Society National Council. In 2019, Governor Whitmer appointed
her as Co-Chair of the Michigan Joint Task Force on Jail and Pretrial Incarceration. Chief
Justice McCormack publishes on a broad range of topics in professional
journals.
As the Chief
Justice, McCormack has promoted statewide initiatives devoted to improving the
courts service to the public, and in particular delivering on a promise that
courts are independent, accessible, engaged with their communities and
efficient. For example, together with the Attorney General, she launched an
Elder Abuse Taskforce, which is actively working on improvements to the service
to seniors in courts. Additional
successful initiatives by Chief Justice McCormack include the Michigan Access
for all Taskforce, Online Dispute Resolution throughout Michigan’s courts, the
first expungement clinics in the state, and Michigan’s participation in the Regional
Judicial Opioid Initiative (RJOI).
Chief Justice
McCormack is married to Steven Croley, a partner at Latham and Watkins, and continues
to teach at the University of Michigan Law School. They have four adult children and enjoy
frequent family trips to west Michigan. |