Suzanne Mitchell has served as a U.S. Magistrate Judge in the Western District of Oklahoma since February 1, 2013. In May 2020, Chief Justice John G. Roberts appointed her to serve as the Magistrate Judge on the International Judicial Relations Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference. She also chaired the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts’ Magistrate Judge Advisory Group from 2018-23, served on the Human Resources Advisory Council from 2019-23, and currently serves on the Court Administration and Operations Advisory Council. She has been named to the Board of the Federal Judicial Center, beginning in March 2025. She chaired the Western District of Oklahoma’s Criminal Justice Act Panel Selection Committee for eleven years, and served on the Court-Assisted Recovery Effort Program, a trauma-informed federal reentry court that focuses on intensive treatment to help recently released nonviolent offenders reintegrate into society for eleven years, five as presiding Judge.
She has also traveled extensively to train lawyers and judges in how to promote the rule of law in their home countries. In 2022, she trained prosecutors and defense counsel in North Macedonia on expert witnesses and cross examination with the Office of Overseas Prosecutorial Development, Assistance and Training. In 2023, she traveled to Kenya with Lawyers Without Borders to train resource support providers and prosecutors on addressing human trafficking. That same year, she began traveling to India to train local judges, first in 2023 on a trip focusing on human trafficking, then in 2024 on three different trips focusing on transnational crimes, including trafficking in narcotics and wildlife, as well as cybercrime. These workshops were implemented by the CEELI Institute in partnership with India’s National Judicial Academy. Also in 2024, she traveled to Uzbekistan to present on pretrial release and probable cause with Regional Dialogue.
Judge Mitchell served as President of the Oklahoma City Chapter of the Federal Bar Association for 2017-18, served as the FBA’s Vice President for the Tenth Circuit from 2018-21. She received the FBA’s Outstanding Chapter Leadership Award for her service and is an active student mentor for the FBA in Oklahoma City. She currently serves on the FBA’s Judiciary Division as its Vice President (2024-25).
She has been named a Master of the William J. Holloway American Inn of Court and served as the Inn’s President for 2018 19. She is a Board member of the Federal Magistrate Judge’s Association, and has served as an Oklahoma County Bar Association Board member, and as a Board member of the Western District of Oklahoma’s Historical Society and Judicial Learning Center.
Judge Mitchell is President of the Rotary Club of Oklahoma City (2024-25), the third largest Rotary Club in the world with nearly 600 members. She has previously served as an officer, board member, and various committee chairs. She is also a member of Leadership Oklahoma City Class XIV, former chair of the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition, and former board member of various nonprofits.
Her professional experience includes serving as an appellate practitioner at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Western District of Oklahoma, as Senior Law Clerk for former U.S. Tenth Circuit Judge Robert H. Henry, and as a corporate and securities attorney at McAfee & Taft’s Oklahoma City office.
A graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, she also studied at the London School of Economics. She earned her law degree with high honors from George Washington University, where she was awarded Order of the Coif and served as an editor on the George Washington Law Review and a member of the Moot Court Board.
She lives in Oklahoma City with her husband Sam Fulkerson, a senior partner in Ogletree Deakins’s Oklahoma City office. They have four children and two doodles.