Doris Pryor (1977–)

Doris Pryor is a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. She assumed that role in December 2022 after serving in a variety of legal positions since her graduation from law school and admission to the bar in 2003.

Doris Lenea Clark was born in 1977 in Hope (Hempstead County) to James and Linda Clark. She and her brother Michael grew up in Hope, and she was an honor student and president of the school’s student government. After graduation from Hope High School in 1994, Clark attended the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) in Conway (Faulkner County), from which she graduated cum laude in 1999.

She spent the year after her graduation from UCA working in Hope, heading to law school at Indiana University Bloomington the following year. While at Indiana, she served on the editorial staff of the Federal Communications Journal and was named top oralist at the Sherman Minton Moot Court Competition. She met Johnny Pryor during law school; they married and had a son.

After her graduation from law school in 2003, she worked in St. Louis, Missouri, as a law clerk for Judge Lavenski Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, serving from 2003 to 2004. Pryor followed that with a second clerkship, this time in Arkansas, working for Judge Leon Holmes of U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas from 2004 to 2005. Following her clerkships, she worked for a year as a deputy public defender in the Arkansas Public Defender Commission.

In August 2006, she became assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, handling criminal matters and federal appeals while also working as the office’s reentry and prevention coordinator. In September 2014, she was named national security chief for the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

In March 2018, she was named U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Southern District of Indiana, and in May 2022, she was nominated by President Joe Biden to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, a position for which she was confirmed with bipartisan support by the U.S. Senate on December 5, 2022 (although the U.S. senators from Arkansas, Tom Cotton and John Boozman, voted against her). Upon her confirmation, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “With over a decade of experience in public service, Judge Pryor is now making history as the first woman of color from Indiana to ever sit on the Seventh Circuit.”

Active within the profession, Pryor has served as program chair, secretary, and newsletter chair for the Indianapolis branch of the Federal Bar Association. She has also served as chair of the Indianapolis Bar Association Diversity Job Fair’s student workshop.

Pryor has been actively involved in the Indianapolis community. While in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, she conducted middle school programs that spotlighted the role young people can play in reducing gun violence. She also helped connect female students with mentors in the legal profession. While serving as a U.S. Magistrate Judge, Pryor coordinated the court’s annual “Federal Courts Day,” and she played an important role in the development and growth of the district’s Re-Entry And Community Help (REACH) courts, a program that gives the formerly incarcerated access to resources to help them transition back into the community. Judge Pryor also has taught criminal law courses at the Indiana University School of Law and has helped coach Butler University’s mock trial team.

Pryor has served as board chair of Goodwill Education Initiatives, Inc., and became a member of Just the Beginning Foundation, an organization focused on encouraging at-risk young people from a variety of backgrounds to pursue career opportunities in the legal profession. That program had its roots in a visit that Pryor, then serving as national security unit chief and prevention coordinator in the U.S. Attorney’s Office, made to a career day program in an Indianapolis middle school, one that made her realize the students could not imagine themselves as lawyers. Pryor partnered with other groups and colleagues to help the young students broaden their horizons.

Pryor and her family live in Carmel, Indiana.

For additional information:
“Doris L. Pryor Fact Sheet.” Alliance for Justice. https://afj.org/nominee/doris-l-pryor/ (accessed March 15, 2024).

Hackney, Suzette. “Mining Diamonds in Indy’s Rough.” Indianapolis Star, June 12, 2016, pp. 19A, 20A.

Henry, Carmie. “What’s in the Water in Hope?” Arkansas Strong, June 8, 2023. https://arstrong.org/whats-in-the-water-in-hope/ (accessed March 15, 2024).

“Judge Doris L. Pryor.” Courts Matter. https://courtsmatter.org/nominees/judge-doris-l-pryor/ (accessed March 15, 2024).

United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Questionnaire for Judicial Nominees. https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Pryor%20SJQ%20Public%20Final.pdf (accessed March 15, 2024).

“U.S. Senate Confirms Judge Doris Pryor ’03 to Seventh Circuit.” Maurer School of Law, Indiana University Bloomington, December 6, 2022. https://blogs.iu.edu/maurerlaw/2022/12/06/u-s-senate-confirms-judge-doris-pryor-03-to-seventh-circuit/ (accessed March 15, 2024).

William H. Pruden III
Ravenscroft School