Chief Justice Roderick L. Ireland
Roderick L. Ireland is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court
. A native of
Springfield
,
Massachusetts
, he received his Bachelor of Arts from
Lincoln
University
; Juris Doctor from
Columbia
Law
School
; Master of Laws from
Harvard
Law
School
; and Doctor of Philosophy in Law, Policy, and Society from
Northeastern
University
. Chief Justice
Ireland
began his legal career in 1969 as a Neighborhood Legal Services attorney, then worked as a public defender with the Roxbury Defenders Committee, as chief attorney, deputy director, and executive director. He was Assistant Secretary and Chief Legal Counsel for the Massachusetts Executive Office of Administration and Finance, and Chair of the Massachusetts Board of Appeals on Motor Vehicle Liability Policies and Bonds.
Chief Justice
Ireland
has been a jurist for more than thirty-four years, serving as a judge of the Juvenile Court from 1977 to 1990, after which he was appointed an Associate Justice of the Massachusetts Appeals Court (1990-1997). He was first appointed as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court
in 1997, by Governor William F. Weld. He became the Senior Associate Justice in 2008. In 2010, he was appointed as the thirty-sixth Chief Justice by Governor Deval Patrick and was sworn in on December 20. Chief Justice
Ireland
has been an adjunct faculty member at
Northeastern
University
since 1978, and on the faculty of the Appellate Judges Seminar at
New York
University
Law
School
since 2001. He is the author of the Juvenile Law volume of Thomson/West Publishing's Massachusetts Practice Series, the second edition of which was published in 2006, as well as law review articles. When he was appointed to the Supreme Judicial Court
in 1997, he was the first African-American Justice in its then 305 year history and now serves as its first African-American Chief Justice.