Michael Chagares

Michael A. Chagares (born 1962) is a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

Education

Chagares received his B.A. from Gettysburg College in 1984 and his J.D. from Seton Hall University School of Law in 1987.

Legal career

Chagares began his legal career in 1987-1988 as a law clerk for Judge Morton Greenberg on the Third Circuit. He now occupies the same seat Greenberg once held. Chagares was in private practice the next two years before joining the United States Department of Justice as an Assistant United States Attorney in 1990. He rose to become chief of the Civil Division for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New Jersey in 1999, but left the Justice Department in 2004 to return to private practice in New Jersey.

Since 1991, Chagares has been an adjunct professor at Seton Hall University School of Law.

Federal judicial service

Chagares was nominated to the Third Circuit by President George W. Bush on January 25, 2006 to fill the seat vacated by Michael Chertoff, who resigned to become Secretary of Homeland Security. Chagares's nomination moved unusually swiftly through the U.S. Senate, and he was confirmed just over two months later on April 4, 2006 by a vote of 98-0. Chagares was the fifth judge appointed to the Third Circuit by Bush.