{"county":"shelby","description":"(Nonpartisan) (Current Occupation): Sugarmon was elected as Juvenile Court Judge in August of 2022 and is responsible for the Administrative Services Division, the Court Services Division, and the Child Support Services Division. (Education): Sugarmon graduated from Morehouse College with a degree in Banking and Finance and shortly after, he attended Howard University School of Law graduating in 1983 and also passed the TN Bar Exam. He then became a part-time trial attorney with the Shelby County Public Defender\u2019s Office and an Associate with the firm Wharton and Wharton. In 1992, Judge Sugarmon went on to become a partner with the firm of Noel and Sugarmon, and in 1998, Judge Sugarmon was appointed to Division 2 of the Memphis Municipal Court and has been re-elected 4 times since then.\n","district":"Shelby","districtgroup":"county","id":93,"key":"juvenile_court_judge","lastchangeby":null,"name":"Tarik B. Sugarmon","next_election":"2022-11-08","notes":"103","officegroup":null,"partisan":0,"party":"","qualities":"- Juvenile-court judge: hears delinquency, dependency-and-neglect, and child-custody/support cases. Authority blends judicial and quasi-administrative; outcomes affect children and family services systems.\n- Judicial temperament: the willingness to listen, deliberate, and apply the law dispassionately to people whose lives are deeply affected by the outcome.\n- Impartiality and ethics under the Tennessee Rules of Judicial Conduct, including disqualification when conflicts arise.\n- Working knowledge of the substantive and procedural law applied in the assigned court (cited per court below) and the published precedent that controls.\n- Docket management \u2014 moving cases efficiently while honoring due process and the time pressures that fall on litigants and witnesses.\n- Clear written and oral explanation of rulings, so the parties and the public can follow the reasoning.","quantity":1,"source":null,"state":"TN","term_end":"2030-09-01","term_start":"2022-09-01","term_years":8,"terms":[{"current":1,"description":"","electiondate":"2022-08-02","name":"Tarik B. Sugarmon","person":{"biography":"Judge Tarik B. Sugarmon is a 1978 Graduate of Morehouse College with a Degree in Banking and Finance. After college he worked as a Commercial Loan Specialist with Northwestern Mutual in Chicago, IL, and then returned to Memphis to take a job with NBC Bank as a Commercial Loan Analyst.\n\n In 1980 he left Memphis to attend Howard University School of Law graduating in 1983. Judge Sugarmon passed the Tennessee Bar Exam and was admitted October 1983. That same month he became a part-time Trial Attorney with the Shelby County Public Defender\u2019s Office and an Associate with the firm of Wharton and Wharton.\n\n\nIn 1992 Judge Sugarmon became a partner in the firm of Noel and Sugarmon handling Criminal and Civil Litigation cases. In 1998 Judge Sugarmon was appointed to Division II of the Memphis Municipal Court and has been re-elected four times.\nA native Memphian, Judge Sugarmon is the son of the late Judge Russell B. Sugarmon and the late Dr. Miriam DeCosta-Willis. His parents exposed he and his sisters to the cultural, social, religious, and ethnic diversity of Memphis.\n\n\nJudge Sugarmon attended Morehouse College, from which he received a B. A. degree in banking and finance. Sugarmon entered Howard University School of Law, where he was third in his first-year class and graduated in the top five percent of graduates. Returning to Memphis after graduation in 1983, he passed the Tennessee Bar Exam on the first attempt and was admitted to the bar that October.\n\n\nAugust 4, 2022 Judge Sugarmon was elected Judge for the Juvenile Court of Memphis and Shelby County, Tennessee.","firstname":"Tarik","lastname":"Sugarmon","middlename":"B","token":"MOw0UvQ6Xc"},"term_end":"2030-09-01","term_start":"2022-09-01"}],"title":"Juvenile Court Judge","type":"judicial","url":null,"whenchanged":"2026-04-25 19:49:19"}