Francis Joseph William Ford (December 23, 1882 – May 26, 1975) was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Education and career Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Ford spent his childhood in South Boston and attended the Boston Latin School. He received an Artium Baccalaureus degree from Harvard University in 1904, where he met Franklin D. Roosevelt. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1906 but did not receive his Bachelor of Laws until 1907 due to the fact that he could not afford the $20 diploma cost. He was in private practice of law in Boston from 1906 to 1933. He was a member of the Boston City Council from 1917 to 1922. He was appointed as the United States Attorney for the District of Massachusetts by President Roosevelt, serving from 1933 to 1938. Ford unsuccessfully ran for District Attorney of Suffolk County, Massachusetts. Service as United States Attorney Ford was particularly alarmed at the growing rate of marijuana use among Boston teenagers. Ford, along with Boston Police Commissioner Joseph Timilty, created a campaign with the Federal Narcotics Bureau to "nip the evil flower of marijuana in the bud." This was primarily the result of an incident in South Boston during which teenagers fired at police while apparently under the influence of marijuana. The teens had just come from a "tea party" in South Boston, which at the time referred to a party at which marijuana was smoked. As United States Attorney, Ford successfully prosecuted two mail-robbers in U.S. v. Rettich which was upheld on appeal. In this case, the defendants were found guilty of both conspiracy to assault a mail truck driver and robbing the driver of United States mail. They were also indicted and found guilty for assaulting the truck driver with a dangerous weapon, thus "effecting a robbery of said registered mail." The defendants' main argument was that the trial court erred in allowing certain evidence ($10,000 found buried in Rettich's yard) because it was obtained through illegal search and seizure. The court wrote that "evidence secured even by an unlawful search and seizure by state officers, when not acting in behalf of the federal government, is admissible in a prosecution for a federal offense in the United States Courts, whether seized under an invalid search warrant or without any warrant at all." Federal judicial service Ford was