Terry Lucas Butts [1] (born February 15, 1944) is an Alabama lawyer, politician, and judge who served as a justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama from 1994 to 1998.
Born in Patsburg, Crenshaw County, Alabama, [2] to Ezra Lucas Butts and Nata Watson Butts, [3] Butts received a B.A. from Troy University, followed by a J.D. from the University of Alabama School of Law in 1968. [2] [4] He engaged in private practice for eight years. [4]
He served a five-year term as a city judge in Elba, Alabama, and served as county judge for Coffee County, Alabama, before being elected as a circuit judge for Pike and Coffee counties three times, being the presiding judge of the circuit for the last several years. [2]
In 1994, Butts ran as a Democrat for a seat on the Supreme Court of Alabama vacated by the retirement of Justice Henry B. Steagall II, winning election to the office. [2] [5] He was the first person from Crenshaw County to serve on the court. [6]
Butts retired from the court in 1998, [5] running for Attorney General of Alabama that same year, which he lost to William H. Pryor Jr. [4]
In 2004, when Justice Roy Moore was fighting his expulsion from a seat on the state supreme court, Butts was one of the leading members of Moore's legal team. [7] In 2017, it was speculated that Butts might run for a seat in the state senate, [8] though this did not materialize. In 2023, the Troy University Alumni Association announced that Butts would serve as legal counsel to its board of directors. [9]
Butts married his wife Suzanne, with whom he had two children. [4]