{{short description|American lawyer}} {{About|the prosecutor|other people named Robert Ray|Robert Ray (disambiguation){{!}}Robert Ray}} {{Use mdy dates|date=January 2020}} {{Infobox officeholder |name = Robert Ray |office = Independent Counsel for the Whitewater Scandal |term_start = October 18, 1999 |term_end = March 13, 2002 |predecessor = Ken Starr |successor = Julie Thomas |birth_name = Robert William Ray |birth_date = {{birth date and age|1960|4|4}} |birth_place = Frankfurt, West Germany |death_date = |death_place = |party = Republican |spouse = Jade Cantor |education = Princeton University {{small|(BA)}}<br>Washington and Lee University {{small|(JD)}} }} '''Robert William Ray''' (born April 4, 1960) is an American lawyer. As the successor to Ken Starr as the head of the Office of the Independent Counsel (1999 to 2002) he investigated and issued the final reports on the Whitewater controversy, the White House travel office controversy, and the White House FBI files controversy. Before that he was Deputy Independent Counsel investigating former Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy and before that Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York.<ref name="WhoWho"> "Robert William Ray." Marquis Who's Who TM. Marquis Who's Who, 2008. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2008. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/BioRC Document Number: K2015365641. Fee. Accessed November 1, 2008.</ref>
== Education == Ray received his A.B. from Princeton University in 1982, and his Juris Doctor ''cum laude'' from the Washington and Lee University School of Law in 1985.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ead.lib.virginia.edu/vivaxtf/view?docId=wl-law/vilxwl00007.xml|title=A Guide to the Robert W. Ray Papers, 1994-2001 Ray, Robert W., Papers, 1994-2001 010|website=ead.lib.virginia.edu|access-date=2020-01-18}}</ref>
== Career == After graduating from law school, Ray was a clerk for Frank Altimari, a Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Under independent counsel Donald Smaltz, he prosecuted Mike Espy, and then worked under Ken Starr.
He was an unsuccessful candidate for a non-partisan school board in Brooklyn, New York 1993 and 1996, on the "children's slate." He was briefly a candidate in the 2002 United States Senate elections in New Jersey.<ref name="WhoWho" /><ref name="Weiser1999"> {{cite news |first=Benjamin |last=Weiser |title= An Aggressive Prosecutor Now Enters the Limelight as Starr's Successor |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9505E6D61030F93AA25751C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all |work=New York Times |date=December 19, 1999 |accessdate=November 1, 2008 |author2=Neil A. Lewis}} </ref><ref name="PryorCushmanProfile"> {{cite web|url=http://www.pryorcashman.com/attorneys-158.html|title=Pryor Cashman LLP: Robert W. Ray|accessdate=November 1, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080905184946/http://www.pryorcashman.com/attorneys-158.html|archive-date=September 5, 2008|url-status=dead}} </ref>
In 2020, he served on President Donald Trump's legal defense team before his first impeachment trial.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/17/us/politics/robert-ray-trump-legal-team.html|title=Robert Ray Wanted to Indict Clinton. He Thinks Trump Will Be Vindicated|last=Sullivan|first=Eileen|date=2020-01-17|work=The New York Times|access-date=2020-01-18|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
== References == {{reflist}}
==External links== *{{C-SPAN|81330}}
{{Special prosecutors and independent counsels of the U.S.}} {{First impeachment and impeachment trial of Donald Trump}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ray, Robert W.}} Category:1960 births Category:American prosecutors Category:Emigrants from West Germany to the United States Category:Living people Category:New Jersey lawyers Category:New York (state) lawyers Category:Jurists from Frankfurt Category:Princeton University alumni Category:Washington and Lee University School of Law alumni Category:Whitewater controversy Category:Members of the defense counsel for the first impeachment trial of Donald Trump Category:Donald Trump attorneys Category:Special prosecutors Category:20th-century American lawyers Category:21st-century American lawyers