Robert Illman

Robert Morgan Illman is currently a U.S. Magistrate Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

Judge Illman graduated with a degree in history from Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, Georgia and received his law degree from the University of Alabama School of Law in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Following law school, Judge Illman practiced law for four years in Montgomery, Alabama as an Assistant Federal Public Defender from 2003-2007, where he represented indigent defendants charged with various crimes in federal trial and appellate courts, and also represented Alabama's death row inmates in their federal habeas corpus litigation.

From 2007-2014, Judge Illman served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Wallace Capel, Jr., Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Alabama.

In 2014-2017, Judge Illman served as a judicial law clerk to the Honorable Nandor J. Vadas, U.S. Magistrate Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, whose magistrate judgeship seat Judge Illman would eventually replace.

Judicial service

On November 6, 2017, Judge Illman was appointed as a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of California. He assumed the magistrate judgeship vacated by retiring Eureka Division U.S. Magistrate Judge Nandor J. Vadas.

Judge Illman currently serves in the Eureka Division of the Northern District of California at the Eureka-McKinleyville Courthouse located in McKinleyville, California. As a result, all new civil and criminal actions arising in the counties of Del Norte, Lake, Humboldt, and Mendocino are assigned directly to Judge Illman, subject to consent under 28 USC § 636(c)(1).