Barbara Milano Keenan

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Barbara Milano Keenan (born March 1, 1950) is an American judge who serves as a senior judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. She previously served as a justice on the Virginia Supreme Court.

Early life and education
Keenan was born in Vienna, Austria, and raised in Northern Virginia. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Cornell University in 1971, a Juris Doctor from George Washington University Law School in 1974, and a Master of Laws from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1992.

Career highlights
From 1974 to 1976, Keenan was an assistant commonwealth’s attorney in Fairfax County, Virginia. She then entered private practice, first as a solo practitioner and later with the firm Keenan, Ardis and Roehrenbeck. In 1980, she became a judge of the Fairfax County General District Court. In 1982, she became the first woman elected to a Virginia Circuit Court judgeship. In 1985, she was among the first ten judges named to the newly created Court of Appeals of Virginia, becoming the first woman to serve at Virginia’s appellate level. She is the first woman to serve on all levels of the Virginia court system.

Virginia Supreme Court
Keenan was elected a justice of the Virginia Supreme Court in 1991, succeeding Charles S. Russell, and was reelected in 2003 to a second 12-year term, serving until 2010. She wrote the foreword to the first volume of Jurist Prudent in 2011.

Federal judicial service
In 2009, Keenan was considered for a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. President Barack Obama nominated her in September 2009, and the Senate confirmed her nomination by a 99–0 vote on March 2, 2010. She received her commission on March 9, 2010, and assumed senior status on August 31, 2021.

Notable cases
In Seay v. Cannon (2019), Keenan, joined by A. Marvin Quattlebaum Jr., held that double jeopardy bars retrial after a mistrial granted over a defendant’s objection; Paul V. Niemeyer dissented. The Supreme Court denied certiorari on March 30, 2020.

In a 2021 Title IX-related decision about a charter school’s dress code, Keenan dissented in part, arguing that requiring female students to wear skirts reinforced outdated gender stereotypes and did not reflect equality in contemporary society.