Who appointed Rubén Castillo?

President William J. Clinton appointed Rubén Castillo to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in 1994.

Was Rubén Castillo appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?

Rubén Castillo was appointed by President William J. Clinton, a Democrat. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.

What was Rubén Castillo's confirmation vote?

Rubén Castillo was confirmed by voice vote on May 6, 1994. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.

Northern District of Illinois / Appointed 1994 / Served to 2019

Rubén Castillo

Judge, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

Appointed by President William J. Clinton in 1994 and confirmed by voice vote, Rubén Castillo was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. He earned a law degree from Northwestern University School of Law (now Pritzker School of Law) in 1979. Rulings & record ↓ Sources ↓

Born: 1954 · age 72
Appointed by: William J. Clinton, 1994
Confirmed: by voice vote
Education: Loyola Chicago 1976 · Northwestern Law (now Pritzker School of Law) 1979
Succeeded: Nicholas John Bua
Succeeded by: Franklin Ulyses Valderrama

Federal judicial service

Year	Court	Appointed by	Vote
1994	Northern District of Illinois succeeded Nicholas John Bua	Clinton (D)	Voice vote

Party letters show the appointing president’s party, not the judge’s own. A voice vote means the chamber approved aloud. No senator-by-senator tally is recorded.

Confirmation vote

Voice vote

The Senate approved this confirmation aloud, with no senator-by-senator tally recorded. Recorded roll-call votes begin in 1989.

Education

Loyola University Chicago	B.A.	1976
Northwestern University School of Law (now Pritzker School of Law)	J.D.	1979

Judicial Record

Caseload & case types

In our data, Castillo was assigned 6,619 district-court cases (1986–2019). Median time from filing to termination: 66 days across 6,616 closed cases.

Civil rights18%

Labor & ERISA17%

Other federal statutes13%

Prisoner & habeas11%

Real property11%

Contract10%

Other19%

Case assignment is from CourtListener’s PACER-derived docket records: a partial sample, not a complete caseload, reflecting the judge last assigned each case. How we count.

On appeal

Of 149 of Castillo’s decisions reviewed on the merits by the U.S. courts of appeals in our data, 106 were affirmed, 33 reversed or vacated, and 10 affirmed in part and reversed in part. This is a historical count of appellate outcomes for cases we could match, not a judgment of the judge, and not a complete record. How we count.

In our data, Castillo authored 580 published opinions for the court (1994–2011). Most cited: Jirak v. Abbott Laboratories, Inc. (89 citations).

A selective record from published opinions in the CourtListener corpus, not every ruling; most unpublished district orders are not included. Counts and rankings are objective and recomputable: how we count. We describe the record, not the judge.

Recent & notable rulings

Year	Case	Citation	Cited
2008	Jirak v. Abbott Laboratories, Inc.	566 F. Supp. 2d 845	89
1998	Jenkins v. Union Corp.	999 F. Supp. 1120	57
2011	Van Tassell v. United Marketing Group, LLC	795 F. Supp. 2d 770	53
2011	Ibarra v. City of Chicago	816 F. Supp. 2d 541	49
1997	Cremin v. Merrill Lynch Pierce Fenner & Smith, Inc.	957 F. Supp. 1460	44
1999	Hodes v. Apfel	61 F. Supp. 2d 798	41
1994	Smith v. Dovenmuehle Mortgage, Inc.	859 F. Supp. 1138	40
1998	Levit v. Spatz (In Re Spatz)	222 B.R. 157	37
1995	Celex Group, Inc. v. Executive Gallery, Inc.	877 F. Supp. 1114	37
2004	Mielke v. Laidlaw Transit, Inc.	313 F. Supp. 2d 759	36
1996	Demitropoulos v. Bank One Milwaukee, N.A.	915 F. Supp. 1399	36
1998	Luckey v. Baxter Healthcare Corp.	2 F. Supp. 2d 1034	35
2009	Whitley v. Taylor Bean & Whitacker Mortgage Corp.	607 F. Supp. 2d 885	33
1996	Zarecki v. National Railroad Passenger Corp.	914 F. Supp. 1566	33
1995	Palmer v. Circuit Court of Cook County, Soc. Serv.	905 F. Supp. 499	33

Showing the 15 most-cited of 580 authored opinions in our data. “Cited” is inbound citations across the CourtListener corpus. Case links open the ruling’s full text (CourtListener) or its page here; read the methodology and verify against the primary source.

Questions & answers

Who appointed Rubén Castillo?: President William J. Clinton appointed Rubén Castillo to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in 1994.
Was Rubén Castillo appointed by a Democrat or a Republican?: Rubén Castillo was appointed by President William J. Clinton, a Democrat. JudicialFinder records the appointing president's party, not a judge's own politics.
What was Rubén Castillo's confirmation vote?: Rubén Castillo was confirmed by voice vote on May 6, 1994. No senator-by-senator tally was recorded.
Which court was Rubén Castillo on?: Rubén Castillo was a Judge on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.

Sources

Each fact on this page traces to a primary public record.

How we source & reconcile data → Data & Sources

See something wrong? Report an error. Fixes are logged in the corrections log.

25 years on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Data as of 2026-08-10. Informational only; verify against the primary source before relying. Not a consumer report (FCRA).