For 32 years, Judge Wilford Taylor Jr. served on the bench in his hometown of Hampton.

State judges have saluted the retired jurist with the 2019 Harry L. Carrico Outstanding Career Service Award for his work on the bench.

Judge Taylor, who retired from the bench in December 2017, was presented the top award of the Judicial Council of Virginia May 15 during the council’s annual conference for state judges.

The presentation to the African-American honoree was freighted with irony as the award is named for the late chief justice of the Virginia Supreme Court, a one-time segregation advocate who is best remembered for his ruling in the Loving case upholding a state law banning interracial marriage that the U.S. Supreme Court later struck down.

Justice Carrico was an active justice on the state’s highest court for more than 42 years. He died in 2013.

The 14-member council yearly presents the award to a Virginia judge who “has demonstrated exceptional leadership in the administration of the courts while exhibiting the traits of integrity, courtesy, impartiality, wisdom and humility.”

Born in Hampton, Judge Taylor began his legal career after graduating from Hampton University and the College of William & Mary Law School. He worked in private practice and as a deputy city attorney for Hampton before the General Assembly elected him a Hampton General District Court judge in 1985.

Ten years later, he was elected a judge on the Hampton Circuit Court. He served four terms as chief judge before his retirement in 2007.

Since leaving the bench, he has joined the McGammon Group, which specializes in mediation, arbitration and other forms of alternative dispute resolution.

He also is a retired U.S. Army colonel, with 28 years of service in the reserves, and serves as an adjunct professor at the College of William & Mary Law School. — JEREMY M. LAZARUS