Richard N. Palmer

Justice Richard N. Palmer is an Associate Justice on the Connecticut Supreme Court. He was born on May 27, 1950 in Hartford, CT. He received his Bachelors of Arts, Phi Beta Kappa, from Trinity College in Hartford in 1972. He went on to receive Juris Doctor, with high honors, from the University of Connecticut School of Law, in 1977.

Following law school, Justice Palmer clerked for Honorable Jon O. Newman. On March 17, 1993, he was sworn in as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

On October 10, 2008, Justice Palmer wrote the majority opinion for the Connecticut Supreme Court case Kerrigan, Elizabeth, et al., v. Connecticut Department of Health, et al., granting marriage rights to same-sex couples in Connecticut, striking down a law passed in 2005 granting civil union rights to them.