Cathy Bissoon

Cathy Bissoon (born May 16, 1968) is a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. Previously, she was a United States magistrate judge of the same court. She was appointed to as a district judge by President Barack Obama and was confirmed by the United States Senate in October 2011. Early life and education Bissoon was born on May 16, 1968, in Brooklyn, New York. Bissoon's father was from Puerto Rico and her mother from Trinidad. When Bissoon was four years old, her father was killed in a stabbing close to the family home in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. Bissoon's mother later remarried and the family moved to Queens, New York. Bissoon attended Alfred University in New York, where she graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in political science in 1990. She earned her Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School in 1993. Career After completing law school, Bissoon joined the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, office of Reed Smith, practicing in the firm's labor and employment group. While at Reed Smith, Bissoon took a one-year leave of absence to serve as a law clerk for Judge Gary L. Lancaster of the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. In 2007, Bissoon joined the Pittsburgh law firm of Cohen & Grigsby where she was the Director of the firm's Labor & Employment Group. Federal judicial service In July 2008, Bissoon was selected to serve as a United States magistrate judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, replacing Judge Francis X. Caiazza. She joined the bench on August 1, 2008, and is the first woman of color to sit on the federal bench in Pittsburgh. Bissoon, who is Hispanic and Indian, is also the first woman of Indian descent to sit on a federal court in the United States.