Pierre Nelson Leval is a
judgeA judge, or arbiter of justice, is a lead official who presides over a court of law, either alone or as part of a panel of judges. The powers, functions, method of appointment, discipline, and training of judges vary widely across different jurisdictions. The judge is like an umpire in a game and...
on the
United States Court of Appeals for the Second CircuitThe United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals...
. At the time of his appointment by
PresidentPresident is a title held by many leaders of organizations, companies, trade unions, universities, and countries. Etymologically, a "president" is one who presides, who sits in leadership...
Bill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He was the third-youngest president; only Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy were younger when entering office...
in 1993, he was a United States District Court Judge in the Southern District of New York.
Judge Leval received his
B.A.Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences or both....
degree from
Harvard CollegeHarvard College is one of two undergraduate degree granting schools, and the oldest school, of Harvard University, a private university in the United States founded in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature...
in 1959 and his
J.D.Juris Doctor is a first professional degree.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century as a degree similar to the old European doctor of law degree...
degree magna cum laude in 1963 from
Harvard Law SchoolHarvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. HLS typically ranks among the top law...
, where he served as Note Editor of the
Harvard Law ReviewThe Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School.-Overview:The Review is one of the most cited law reviews in the United States. It is published monthly from November through June, with the November issue dedicated to covering...
.
Judge Leval served in the U.S.
Pierre Nelson Leval is a
judgeA judge, or arbiter of justice, is a lead official who presides over a court of law, either alone or as part of a panel of judges. The powers, functions, method of appointment, discipline, and training of judges vary widely across different jurisdictions. The judge is like an umpire in a game and...
on the
United States Court of Appeals for the Second CircuitThe United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals...
. At the time of his appointment by
PresidentPresident is a title held by many leaders of organizations, companies, trade unions, universities, and countries. Etymologically, a "president" is one who presides, who sits in leadership...
Bill ClintonWilliam Jefferson "Bill" Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He was the third-youngest president; only Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy were younger when entering office...
in 1993, he was a United States District Court Judge in the Southern District of New York.
Judge Leval received his
B.A.Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences or both....
degree from
Harvard CollegeHarvard College is one of two undergraduate degree granting schools, and the oldest school, of Harvard University, a private university in the United States founded in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature...
in 1959 and his
J.D.Juris Doctor is a first professional degree.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century as a degree similar to the old European doctor of law degree...
degree magna cum laude in 1963 from
Harvard Law SchoolHarvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. HLS typically ranks among the top law...
, where he served as Note Editor of the
Harvard Law ReviewThe Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School.-Overview:The Review is one of the most cited law reviews in the United States. It is published monthly from November through June, with the November issue dedicated to covering...
.
Judge Leval served in the U.S. Army in 1959. He was a law clerk for Judge
Henry J. FriendlyHenry Jacob Friendly was a prominent judge in the United States, who sat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1959 through 1974 and in senior status until his death by suicide in 1986.- Before the bench :Judge Friendly graduated from Harvard...
of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1963 until 1964. Judge Leval was an Assistant
United States AttorneyUnited States Attorneys represent the United States federal government in United States district court and United States court of appeals. There are 93 U.S. Attorneys stationed throughout the United States, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands...
in the Southern District of New York from 1964 until 1968, serving there as Chief Appellate Attorney from 1967 to 1968. From 1969 until 1975, Judge Leval was in private law practice as an associate and then a partner in the New York firm of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton. He joined the New York County
District AttorneyIn many jurisdictions in the United States, a District Attorney is the appointed public official who represents the government in the prosecution of alleged offense criminals. The district attorney is the highest officeholder in the jurisdiction's legal department and supervises a staff of...
’s Office in 1975, where he served first as First Assistant District Attorney, and subsequently as Chief Assistant District Attorney. In 1977, he was appointed to the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Judge Leval is a member of the Adjunct Faculty of the
New York University School of LawThe New York University School of Law is the law school of New York University. Established in 1835, the school offers the J.D., LL.M., and J.S.D. degrees in law, and is located in Greenwich Village, in the New York City borough of Manhattan....
. He was awarded the Hillmon Memorial Fellowship by the
University of Wisconsin–MadisonThe University of Wisconsin–Madison is a public research university located in Madison, Wisconsin, United States. Founded in 1848, UW–Madison is the flagship campus of the University of Wisconsin System. It became a land-grant institution in 1866...
in 1988; the Donald R. Brace Memorial Lectureship by the Copyright Society of the U.S.A. in 1989; the Fowler Harper Memorial Fellowship by
Yale Law SchoolYale Law School, or YLS, is the law school of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1843, the school offers the J.D., LL.M., J.S.D., and M.S.L. degrees in law. It also hosts visiting scholars and a number of legal research centers. The school's prestige and small size make its...
in 1992; the Melville Nimmer Lectureship by UCLA Law School in 1997; the
Learned HandBillings Learned Hand was a United States judge and judicial philosopher. He served on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York and later the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit...
Medal of the Federal Bar Council in 1997; and the
University of ConnecticutThe University of Connecticut is the State of Connecticut's land-grant university. It was founded in 1881 and serves more than 28,000 students on its six campuses, including nearly 8,000 graduate students in multiple programs....
School of Law's
Intellectual PropertyIntellectual property is a number of distinct types of legal monopolies over creations of the mind, both artistic and commercial, and the corresponding fields of law...
Keynote Lectureship for 2001. He assumed
senior statusSenior status is a form of semi-retirement for United States federal judges. After federal judges have reached a certain combination of age and years of service on the federal courts, they are allowed to assume senior status. A judge must be at least 65 and have served for 15 years to qualify, with...
in 2002.
Judge Leval is a native of
New YorkNew York is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States and is the nation's third most populous. The state is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
.