[1] On February 11, 1986, Hackett was nominated by President Ronald Reagan to a seat on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan vacated by Judge Charles Wycliffe Joiner.

She was confirmed by the United States Senate on March 27, 1986, and received her commission on April 7, 1986.

In 1987, she stripped former Nazi concentration camp guard Johann Leprich of his American citizenship; she also sentenced former New Jersey Mayor John McCann to life in prison without parole for operating an international cocaine smuggling scheme.

In 1999 Hackett ruled that rap duo OutKast was not required to pay Rosa Parks for using her name in the title of their Grammy-winning song.

[3] Hackett died on December 23, 2018, from declining health at her home in Brighton, Michigan.