Sonia Sotomayor gets Supreme Court Obama Pick

Sonia Sotomayor (born June 25, 1954) is the choice for Supreme Court judge to replace David Souter by President Obama. She is a federal judge on the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Sotomayor is US President Barack Obama's candidate to replace retiring Justice David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Early life and family

Sotomayor was born in The Bronx, New York to Puerto Rican parents. She grew up in a housing project in the South Bronx, just a short walk from Yankee Stadium.[1][2] She was diagnosed with diabetes at age 8.[3] Her father, a tool-and-die worker with a third-grade education, died the following year.[4] Her mother, a nurse, raised Sotomayor and her younger brother, who is now a doctor, on a modest salary. In 1976 Sotomayor married while still a student at Princeton University, and divorced in 1983.[3]

Education and early legal career

Sonia Sotomayor graduated from Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx. She earned her A.B. from Princeton University, summa cum laude, in 1976, where she won the Pyne Prize, the highest general award given to Princeton undergraduates.[5] Sotomayor obtained her J.D. from Yale Law School in 1979, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. Sotomayor then served as an Assistant District Attorney under prominent New York County District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, prosecuting robberies, assaults, murders, police brutality, and child pornography cases. In 1984, she entered private practice, making partner at the commercial litigation firm of Pavia & Harcourt, where she specialized in intellectual property litigation.