David Frank Levi (born August 29, 1951) is a United States jurist and former Dean of the Duke University School of Law. From 1990 to 2007, he was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California, serving as Chief Judge from 2003 to 2007. At the time Levi left the bench, he was widely considered to be one of the top federal judges in the nation. He had been mentioned as a possible nominee to the Supreme Court. Education Levi was born in Chicago, Illinois. His father was Edward H. Levi, a former president of the University of Chicago and United States Attorney General under President Gerald R. Ford. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Harvard University in History and Literature magna cum laude in 1972 and then entered the graduate program in history at Harvard where he eventually specialized in English legal history, receiving a Master of Arts. He received his Juris Doctor in 1980 from the Stanford Law School, where he graduated Order of the Coif and was President of the Stanford Law Review. Career From 1980 to 1981, Levi served as clerk for Judge Ben C. Duniway of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and from 1981 to 1982 as clerk for Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell. In 1983, he joined the United States Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California as a prosecutor. In 1986 he was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of California. Levi directed a major corruption investigation involving several California legislators and was also a member of the Attorney General's Advisory Committee and Chair of the Public Corruption Committee of United States Attorneys. Federal judicial service Levi was nominated by President George H. W. Bush on August 3, 1990, to a seat on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California vacated by Judge Edward Dean Price. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on September 28, 1990, and received commission on October 1, 1990. He served as Chief Judge from 2003 to 2007. His service terminated on June 30, 2007, due to resignation. In 1994 Levi was appointed by Chief Justice William Rehnquist to the Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. He was appointed Chair of the Civil Rules