Federal appellate Judge Evans dies at 71 (UPDATE)

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Federal appellate Court Judge Terry Evans died Wednesday night after a short battle with a serious respiratory illness.

He was 71.

In a statement Thursday from Seventh Circuit Chief Judge Frank Easterbrook, he said Evans, a long-time colleague, died of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and acute respiratory distress syndrome.

“His sudden decline was a shock to all who knew this athletic, outgoing and witty man,” Easterbrook said.

The court will hold a formal memorial service in the coming months.

Evans was nominated to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in 1995 after serving for 16 years as a federal judge in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. He served as chief judge in the district from 1991-95.

He took senior status last year, but continued to handle a significant caseload, said Jon Sanfilippo, clerk of court for the Wisconsin District Court in the Eastern District of Wisconsin, where Evans maintained an office.

“There had been some scuttlebutt floating around that something was wrong,” Sanfilippo said. “Beyond that, nobody I think really thought we’d be getting a call that he passed.”

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His death leaves a void on the court, although the nomination of University of Wisconsin Law Professor Victoria Nourse to succeed Evans is still pending.

Nourse was nominated in July 2010 by President Barack Obama for the opening, but her confirmation has stalled in the U.S. Senate.

Whether the death of Evans will expedite the confirmation is unknown, Sanfilippo said, but the fact that he was still active on the court will certainly have an impact on the workload of the remaining judges.

“As far as the operations of the court,” he said, “when you have someone like Judge Evans who was doing the work making things less stressful, now it becomes a real problem if there is nobody to fill that void.”

According to Seventh Circuit court officials, Evans’ cases began being distributed amongst the other 15 judges when he fell ill and no delays are expected in the processing of cases.

EVANS WAS ONE OF THE
WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL’S
2010 LEADERS IN THE LAW. READ THE STORY.

Katy Borowski, director of projects for the Milwaukee Bar Association, said Evans had been hospitalized in the past month, but the news of his death came as a shock. In fact, she said, he was still doing one of the things he loved most — playing golf — just before he fell ill.

In his statement, Easterbrook joked that, “people can reasonably debate whether he was better at golf or at law; his friends know that he did both very well indeed.”

Known for injecting wit, pop culture references and sports knowledge into his opinions, Evans was “irrepressible, which lifted everyone’s spirits,” Easterbrook said.

Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge Rick Sankovitz called his death “a giant loss.”

Sankovitz clerked for Evans when he was in the Eastern District and was one of three finalists to replace him in the Seventh Circuit.

“It’s kind of like losing Al McGuire, Bob Costas and Louis Brandeis in one fell swoop,” Sankovitz said.

Evans received his law degree from Marquette University Law School in 1967 and spent time as an assistant district attorney in Milwaukee County and in private practice before starting his judicial career as a state court judge in Milwaukee in 1974.