Amy J. St. Eve

Amy J. St. Eve was appointed as a United States Circuit Court Judge for the Seventh Circuit in 2018. Prior to her appointment, Judge St. Eve served as a United States District Court Judge for the Northern District of Illinois from 2002-18. At 36, Judge St. Eve was one of the youngest judges ever appointed in the Northern District of Illinois. During her tenure as a District Court Judge, St. Eve presided over a significant number of complex civil and criminal trials, including high profile trials in United States v. Tony Rezko, United States v. Conrad Black, et al., and United States v. Mohammed Salah, et al. Judge St. Eve also has sat with the Ninth Circuit and Federal Circuit Courts of Appeals. In 2002, St. Eve received Crain’s Chicago Business’ Top Forty Under Forty Award. Judge St. Eve also received the Mary Heftel Hooton award from the Women’s Bar Association of Illinois in 2015. In 2020, Judge St. Eve was awarded the 2020 Judge Joel Flaum Award by the Chicago Inn of Court. St. Eve is also an honorary member of Cornell University’s Quill & Dagger Honor Society.

Judge St. Eve serves as an Adjunct Professor at Northwestern Law School where she teaches trial advocacy and complex civil litigation. She is the co-author of “How Unappealing: An Empirical Analysis of the Gender Gap among Appellate Attorneys,” American Bar Association (2021); “What Juries Really Think: Practical Guidance for Trial Lawyers,” 103 Cornell L. Rev. Online 149 (2018); “More From the #Jury Box: The Latest on Juries and Social Media,” 12 Duke L. & Tech. Rev. 64 (2014); “The Forgotten Pleading,” 7 Fed. Cts. L. Rev. 152 (2012); “Ensuring A Fair Trial in the Age of Social Media,” 11 Duke L. & Tech. Rev. 1 (2012); and “The Fault Allocation Provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 – A Roadmap for Litigants and Courts,” 3 NYU. J. L. & Bus. 187 (Fall 2006). She is also a co-editor of Federal Employment Litigation (The Rutter Group Practice Guide).

Judge St. Eve is the Chair of the Seventh Circuit Pattern Criminal Jury Instructions Committee (2018-present). St. Eve has been a member of the Judicial Conference Committee on the Budget since 2018 and became the Chair of the Budget Committee on October 1, 2021. She previously served as a member of the Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure (2013-19), the liaison to the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Criminal Rules (2013- 19), the Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management (2006- 13), and the Federal Judicial Center’s District Judge Education Advisory Committee (2016-18). Judge St. Eve also served as the Seventh Circuit Representative to the Federal Judges Association (2007-13) and is a prior member of the Northern District of Illinois Patent Local Rules Committee.

Judge St. Eve has been a member of the American Law Institute since 2018 and is an Adviser for the Restatement of the Law Third, Torts: Concluding Provisions. She is on the Board of Directors of the Chicago branch of the Federal Bar Association, and a member of the American Bar Association, the Chicago Bar Association, the Illinois State Bar Association, and the Women’s Bar Association of Illinois. St. Eve served on the Chicago Bar Association’s Board of Managers (2014-16).

Judge St. Eve is a member of the Cornell Law School Advisory Council and previously served as its Chair (2015-18), and a member of the Cornell College of Arts and Sciences’ Advisory Council and the President’s Council of Cornell Women. She also serves on the Board of Directors of Posse Chicago and previously served on the Loyola Academy Board of Trustees.

Judge St. Eve graduated from Cornell University in May 1987 with a B.A. in history. During the summer of 1986, Judge St. Eve attended Oriel College at Oxford University in England. In 1990, Judge St. Eve graduated magna cum laude and Order of the Coif from Cornell Law School. She was a member of the Cornell Law Review and served as an Articles Editor.

From 1990-1994, St. Eve worked as a litigation associate at Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York, New York. St. Eve served as an Associate Independent Counsel for the Whitewater Independent Counsel in Little Rock, Arkansas from 1994-1996 where she second chaired the successful prosecution of former Governor Jim Guy Tucker, Jim McDougal and Susan McDougal for fraud. From August 1996 through April 2001, St. Eve served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Northern District of Illinois. In 2001, St. Eve became Senior Counsel in Litigation at Abbott Laboratories.