N. Patrick Crooks

N. Patrick Crooks
Associate Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court
In office 1996–2015
Preceded by	Roland B. Day
Succeeded by	Rebecca Bradley
Personal details
Born	(1938-05-16)May 16, 1938 Green Bay, Wisconsin, U.S.
Died	September 21, 2015(2015-09-21) (aged 77) Madison, Wisconsin, U.S.
Alma mater	St. Norbert College (B.A.), University of Notre Dame (J.D.)

N. Patrick Crooks (May 16, 1938 – September 21, 2015) was an associate justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, serving from 1996 until his death in 2015. He was appointed as a county judge by a Democratic governor, later professing conservatism as a Supreme Court candidate in 1995 and 1996. In his later years, Crooks gained notice as a perceived judicial moderate and swing vote on a court otherwise divided into two ideological blocs.

Crooks was a native of Green Bay, Wisconsin and graduated from the city's Premontre High School in 1956. He received a bachelor's degree from St. Norbert College in 1960 and a law degree from the University of Notre Dame in 1963.

From 1963-66, Crooks served as an officer in the United States Army, assigned to the Judge Advocate General's Corps in the Pentagon. After his discharge from the Army, Crooks worked for eleven years as a private practice attorney in Green Bay and as an instructor of business law at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

In 1977, Crooks was appointed to the Brown County Court by Governor Martin J. Schreiber, a liberal Democrat. Crooks was designated a circuit court judge in 1978, when Wisconsin's county and circuit courts were merged.

Although appointed by Schreiber, Crooks ran for the Wisconsin Supreme Court in 1995 as a conservative; his campaign was directed by Scott Jensen, a prominent Republican legislator later convicted of criminal ethics violations. He was defeated in the general election by Marathon County circuit judge Ann Walsh Bradley but elected to the court in 1996, defeating appellate judge Ralph Adam Fine of Milwaukee after a contentious campaign.

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