Veteran prosecutor tapped for federal bench
Veteran prosecutor tapped for federal bench (Tribune Illustration)
The U.S. Senate today confirmed the appointment of a veteran federal prosecutor to be a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
Manish Shah, who is chief of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, becomes the first judge of South Asian descent to become a federal judge in Illinois.
Shah, 41, was nominated by President Barack Obama in September to succeed Judge Joan Lefkow, who had taken senior status a year earlier.
The confirmation came in a 95-0 vote.
U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) recommended Shah to the White House in June as part of an agreement with U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). With Democrats in control of the White House, Durbin recommends three judicial nominees for every nominee forwarded to the White House by Kirk.
Durbin praised Shah from the Senate floor, saying he was confident he would make “an excellent addition to the bench.”
The Lakeview resident would begin hearing cases after Obama signs Shah’s judicial commission in the next several days.
“It’s a great honor to have been nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate,” Shah said in an e-mail. “I will miss my colleagues at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, but I look forward to joining my new colleagues on the bench.”
The 1994 Stanford University graduate earned a law degree from the University of Chicago in 1998 and then served for two years as a law clerk for U.S. District Judge James Zagel in Chicago.
He has worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in Chicago since 2001, rising to chief of the criminal division in 2012.  Among his noteworthy prosecutions, Shah helped win convictions of former Chicago Ald. Isaac Carothers and several dozen figures in the City of Chicago’s Hired Truck program, including former City Clerk James Laski and former Streets and Sanitation commissioner Al Sanchez.
Shah’s confirmation will bring the number of active judges on the federal bench in Chicago to 21. Obama has not yet tapped a nominee for a remaining vacancy that has existed since then-Chief Judge James Holderman took senior status at the end of 2013.
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