‘Passing the baton’: Pratt family features 3 generations of Black attorneys, 2 generations of judges

For Lena Pratt Sanders, it was perfectly normal growing up to have her Polly Pocket dolls in one judge’s chamber, a special nameplate and mail slot at the family law office, and a seat at the bench.

Sanders, the Marion Circuit Court magistrate judge, has continued her family’s legal legacy of three generations of Black attorneys in Indianapolis — and has now started the family’s second generation of judges.

Her parents, judges Marcel Pratt and Tanya Walton Pratt, have forged their own paths as attorneys and judges.

Before they each took the bench — both in the Marion Superior Court, and later, for Walton Pratt, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana — the couple worked in private practice at Walton & Pratt with Tanya’s father, Charles Walton, and her brother in Indianapolis.

The Pratts would watch Lena while juries deliberated at the downtown Indianapolis City-County Building or spend time at the family law firm nearby after school.

“Sometimes I’d be in my mom’s chambers or I’d be literally sitting on the bench with her. Like, she’d be sitting on the bench, and they’d pull up a chair for me, I would sit next to her in these murder trials at like 6 years old,” Sanders recalled. “So I’d either be with her or, if the judge would allow it, I’d go with my dad during his breaks and when the jury was deliberating or anything. I literally grew up in the City-County Building — I was there more than I probably was at my own house.”

Neither parent expected Lena to go into law, and certainly not to be on the bench seven years after graduating law school.

“She would always say, ‘When I grow up, I don’t want to have anything to do with politics or the law,’” Walton Pratt said.

Likewise, “I don’t think Lena had any plans, really,” Marcel Pratt said. “But that’s like me. I never had any plans on being a judge. Just popped up.”

The second generation

Sanders said she always felt a connection to the legal field but originally wanted to be a teacher with Teach for America.

She studied English as her major and political science as her minor for her undergraduate degree at Howard University.

After graduating, she decided to take the LSAT and enrolled at the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law.

She said she gets asked a lot if she ever felt pressured to go into the legal field by her parents, but her answer is always “no.”

“I never felt pressured by them. I think that they always let me be a kid,” she said.

Sanders graduated from IU McKinney in 2016. By 2023, she was presiding in the Marion Circuit Court as magistrate judge.

Sanders said she didn’t expect to become a magistrate judge so early on in her career, but she listened to her mom, saw an opportunity and took it.

Prior to becoming a magistrate, Sanders was working as administrative special counsel for the Circuit Court when the magistrate position became available after Marion Circuit Court Judge Amber Collins-Gebrehiwet, the previous magistrate, was elected to the bench in November 2022.

“We didn’t foresee that this opportunity would be coming when it came. And we just kind of went for it,” she said.

Sanders took the bench in January. She said one of her biggest advantages is being able to ask her parents for advice.

“It’s really great to have their wisdom just for a quick call,” she said. “They’ll just reassure me and say, ‘It’s not that big of a deal. Just go up there, listen to the arguments. If you have any questions, ask questions.”

Growing up, Election Day was Sanders’ favorite. Both of her parents initially took the trial bench when Marion Superior Court judgeships were still elected positions.

“I would always look forward to it because when I was a kid, school would be open, but I got to skip school on Election Day. My mom would bring a group of my friends and me, we’d get to ride around to different polling sites and pass out literature (that read), ‘Vote for Judge Pratt,’” Sanders said. “That was just the coolest thing to me, and I was always so proud, too, because my mom would say, ‘Pick one friend,’ and I would pick one friend to come with me and it was just the best thing.”

The first generation

Marcel Pratt and Walton Pratt met at Howard University School of Law.

It was because of an undergrad professor that Marcel even went to law school.

After Marcel took constitutional and property law classes as an undergraduate student, the professor felt law school would be a good path for him.

One day that professor heard him talking in the hallway, and the next thing he knew, he was being dragged into her office and handed a law school application.

He applied and she paid the fee.

“I still thank her to this day for what she did,” Marcel said. “She saw something out of those two classes I took with her and thought it might’ve been something I should do.”

Marcel Pratt was a year ahead of his now-wife in school, so when he graduated, he went to Philadelphia and practiced there for a year.

In 1984, he came to Indiana to help Walton Pratt’s father.

“It was supposed to be for two years,” Marcel said. “That’s the longest two years I’ve ever seen in my life. So here I am. But it’s been very, very good. It’s been good for all of us all around.”

“When I graduated, he loved me enough that we moved to Indiana and he became a Hoosier,” Walton Pratt added. “We came back to Indianapolis and worked with my father and then later my brother joined that law firm. The Midwest is a good place to raise a family and we really wanted to raise a family.”

Walton Pratt eventually rose to the bench as a Marion Superior Court judge and now is chief judge of the U.S. District for the Southern District of Indiana.

“Tanya’s very good,” her husband said. “She was an excellent attorney. We worked well together. She did the groundwork; she was prepared like I’ve never seen anybody prepare. I’m pretty good at the court, so it worked out well.”

He added that he was glad she went the route that she did, but he still would have liked to work together a little longer.

He had been working as a public defender in 2014 when he was elected, taking the bench in 2015 as the Marion Superior Court Traffic Court judge.

“I really enjoyed Traffic Court,” he said. “I got to help a lot of people in Traffic Court.”

Marcel retired from the bench effective May 31. He said he doesn’t like the word “retirement” because it’s not the end.

“I’m going to do something. I’ve still got a little juice left in my tank,” he said.

He has already been offered of counsel positions and other jobs, but for now, his plan is to have two months off and spend more time with his grandchildren.

During the first half of 2023, Sanders and her father got to work in the same building. She said they didn’t see each other, but it was nice to know he was there.

Marcel said he was busy wrapping things up at the Traffic Court, so he didn’t have a chance to see his daughter on the bench. But that’s something he plans to do.

“I went to see her chambers and I still have not seen her sitting on the bench, but I plan to do that as now just attorney Pratt, as opposed to Judge Pratt,” he said. “But I just feel that I’m very proud and happy that I’m passing the baton. I feel it’s my turn to let her basically spread her wings without the influence of me being in the building with her.”•