Hoyt served as a presiding judge of the 125th Civil District Court of Texas from 1981 to 1982.
At the same time, Hoyt was a member of the faculty of the South Texas College Trial Advocacy Program, and from 1983 to 1984, he was an adjunct professor at the Thurgood Marshall School of Law.
[1] On November 24, 1987, Hoyt was nominated by President Ronald Reagan to a seat on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas vacated by Judge Carl Olaf Bue Jr. Hoyt was confirmed by the United States Senate on March 31, 1988, and received his commission on April 1, 1988.
Hoyt was the second African American federal judge in the state of Texas.
[2][3] That judgment was reversed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit before the circuit itself was reversed by the unanimous Supreme Court of the United States in Houston Community College System v. Wilson (2022).