Judge Eric Tostrud ’87
Judge Tostrud was confirmed unanimously to the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota by the U.S. Senate in September 2018. Judge Tostrud graduated from St Olaf College in 1987 with a B.A. (cum laude) in political science and speech. He received his J.D. (summa cum laude) from William Mitchell College of Law in 1990. He clerked for Judge Edward Devitt of the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota from 1990 to 1992, and for Judge George MacKinnon of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in 1992. Judge Tostrud spent his entire career as a practicing lawyer with the Minneapolis firm Lockridge Grindal Nauen. There, Judge Tostrud maintained a complex litigation practice concentrated almost exclusively in the federal courts. His pro bono service included representing military veterans before the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims and assisting a Japanese American obtain benefits in 1991 arising from his family’s internment following the Pearl Harbor attack fifty years earlier. Throughout his career, Judge Tostrud taught frequently at William Mitchell College of Law and at the University of Minnesota Law School. Judge Tostrud’s areas of teaching included legal writing, the federal courts, civil procedure, complex litigation, electronic discovery, and the business of lawyering.