His father also participated in the 1968 march in Memphis, Tennessee, following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. Roberts attended the High School of Music and Art in New York City and was a 1970 graduate.

[3] Roberts studied mathematics at Vassar College, graduating in 1974 with a Artium Baccalaureus degree cum laude.

He is a Master of the Edward Bennett Williams Inn of Court; an Archon in Sigma Pi Phi, Epsilon Boulé; and a member of The DePriest 15 and of the Judicial Council of the Washington Bar Association.

He also served on the faculty of the Department of Justice National Advocacy Center, and has been a writing coach for first year students at Howard Law School.

[5] Roberts has also held positions on the board of directors for the Abramson Scholarship Foundation, as well as the Council for Court Excellence and their executive committee.

Roberts was a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations and co-chaired a local public school restructuring team.

In this position, Roberts prosecuted[7] the murder of two black Salt Lake City joggers who were killed for racial reasons by Joseph Paul Franklin, a white supremacist.

She says he obtained her silence by telling her that if their sexual relationship ever came to light it would surely result in a mistrial for Franklin and his subsequent release.

[8] After his tenure as a trial attorney for the Department of Justice, Roberts joined the international law private practice, Covington & Burling.

[2] Attorney General Janet Reno appointed Roberts to the position of Criminal Section Chief of the United States Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, in 1995.

He served as chief judge and a member of the Judicial Conference of the United States from 2013 until March 16, 2016, when he took inactive senior status.

[16] That same day, Terry Mitchell, the eyewitness from the Franklin trial, filed a federal suit against him, accusing him of repeatedly raping her when she was a witness in a high-profile Utah murder case 35 years earlier.