WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge that President Barack Obama wants to promote to the appellate bench successfully sued the Maryland State Police for racial profiling.
U.S. District Judge Robert Wilkins and his family were pulled over and searched for drugs while driving back from his grandfather's funeral in 1992.
The search has been at the center of a two-decade court fight that's become known as the "driving while black" case.
Wilkins has said his family's roadside detention for an eventual search by a drug-sniffing dog was a "humiliating and degrading experience" and he's been determined to use the courts to prevent it from happening to others.
Obama nominated Wilkins Tuesday to the influential U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
