The Senate Tuesday voted 96-0 to confirm Judge Irene Berger for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia. President Barack Obama nominated the Kanawha County Circuit Court Judge in July. Berger will become the first African American federal judge in West Virginia’s history.

Judge Berger served as a judge on the Circuit Court of Kanawha County, West Virginia for 15 years. After graduating from law school, Berger worked as a staff attorney for the Legal Aid Society of Charleston, where she primarily represented low income clients in matters involving domestic, consumer and landlord-tenant disputes. In 1982, she became an assistant prosecuting attorney for Kanawha County. In 1994, Judge Berger joined the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of West Virginia, and then was appointed by Governor Gaston Caperton to the Circuit Court of Kanawha County.

Judge Berger graduated from West Virginia University in 1976 with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics. She completed her law degree at West Virginia University’s College of Law in 1979. She is a member of the WVU Student Affairs Visiting Committee and former president of the WVU Alumni Association Board of Directors. In 2008, Berger received the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Departmental Alumni Award from the Department of Mathematics.

Read more about Berger’s appointment in The Charleston Gazette or The State Journal.