Federal District Judge Eleanor Ross of the Northern District of Georgia has been identified as the judge who received a private reprimand following findings that she engaged in a sexual relationship with a police commander inside court chambers during business hours, according to a person familiar with the matter.

A special judicial conduct committee of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals recently released a report detailing misconduct by an unnamed federal judge. The report found that the judge engaged in sexual intercourse in chambers over a two-year period, describing the conduct as a “gross lack of judgment” that created an uncomfortable and troubling work environment for law clerks who were aware of the relationship.

The panel further noted that the affair involved a police department commander, raising concerns about a potential conflict of interest and undermining confidence in the impartiality of the judiciary. The judge was ultimately issued a private reprimand.

Judge Ross, who sits on the Atlanta-based U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, did not respond to requests for comment made through her chambers and email. Court representatives also declined to comment.

Ross was nominated to the federal bench by former President and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2014. Before her appointment, she served as a federal prosecutor in Georgia, a prosecutor in the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office, and later as a state court judge.

During her tenure on the bench, Ross presided over several high-profile cases, including the 2022 bank fraud and tax evasion trial of reality television personalities and . The couple were later pardoned by President . She also dismissed a lawsuit filed by Georgia’s Republican senators challenging the state’s mail-in ballot procedures during the 2020 election.

Ross made history as the first Black woman appointed to the Northern District of Georgia. Born in Washington, D.C., to two schoolteachers, she lost her father at the age of eight. According to previous reports, her older sister, a physician, helped finance her legal education at the University of Houston Law Center.

At her Senate confirmation hearing in 2014, Ross introduced her husband, Brian Ross, a former Clayton County prosecutor who currently serves as a Georgia state court judge.