Richard J. Leon (born 1949) is an American lawyer and current federal judge. He has served as a judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia since 2002.
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Leon was born in South Natick, Massachusetts. In 1949,
He received his Bachelor of Arts from the College of the Holy Cross (where he was a classmate of future Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas) in 1971. He received his J.D. from Suffolk University Law School in 1974.
Leon served as a law clerk to the justices of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court from 1974 to 1975 and to Thomas F. Kelleher of the Rhode Island Supreme Court from 1975 to 1976. Leon was an attorney for the Immigration and Naturalization Service of the United States Department of Justice from 1976 to 1977 and a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney in the office of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York working in the Civil Division from 1977 to 1978.
Leon received his LL.M. from Harvard Law School in 1981.
Leon was an assistant professor of law at St. John's University School of Law from 1979 to 1983 and a senior trial attorney in the U.S. Department of Justice from 1983 to 1987. Leon served as deputy chief minority counsel on the Select Committee to Investigate Covert Arms Transactions with Iran of the United States House of Representatives, which investigated the Iran-Contra affair, from 1987 to 1988.
Leon was appointed Deputy Assistant Attorney General and served from 1988 to 1989, when he entered private practice in Washington, D.C., first with Baker & Hostetler from 1989 to 1999 and then with Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease from 1999 to 2002, when he was appointed to the district court.
Leon was a member of the President's Commission on White House Fellowships from 1990 to 1993. Leon was appointed chief minority counsel on the October Surprise Task Force of the House Foreign Affairs Committee from 1992 to 1993. He served as special counsel to the House Financial Services Committee in 1994. He has been an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center since 1997.
Leon was nominated to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia by George W. Bush on September 10, 2001, to the seat vacated by Norma Holloway Johnson. Confirmed by the Senate on February 14, 2002, he received commission five days later.
Leon was responsible for adjudicating the habeas corpus petitions of several dozen captives held at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.[1][2][3] Boumediene v. Bush, which was eventually considered by the Supreme Court, was first heard by Leon.
By August 28, 2008, Leon had 24 cases assigned to him. [1]
The Associated Press reported Leon hoped to resolve those cases before the presidential inauguration in 2009 and was concerned that the public and the detainees will be barred from observing the hearings: "If it can't be done, I have great concern that these hearings will be virtually or exclusively classified, closed to the public and, I might add, to the detainees."
During a hearing on October 23, 2008 Leon commented on the ambiguity of the term "enemy combatant" and criticized Congress and the Supreme Court for "We are here today, much to my dismay, I might add, to deal with a legal question that in my judgment should have been resolved a long time ago. I don't understand, I really don't, how the Supreme Court made the decision it made and left that question open... I don't understand how the Congress could let it go this long without resolving." [2]
On November 20, Judge Leon ordered five detainees released from Guantanamo Bay Naval Base due to insufficient evidence.[4][5]
In January 2010, Judge Leon preliminarily enjoined the Food and Drug Administration from blocking the importation of electronic cigarettes.[6]
On November 7, 2011, Judge Leon issued a preliminary injunction against the FDA for trying to put graphic images on cigarette packs.