She had scrubbed the same floors where attorneys argued million-dollar cases, where judges handed down sentences that changed lives, where justice, real or imagined, was supposed to live.
And she had done it without complaint, without recognition, without anyone ever learning her name.
Naomi had done her homework at that building. Literally.
On nights when her mother worked the late shift and there was no one to stay with her, Gloria would bring her daughter along. Naomi would sit in the basement break room with her textbooks spread across a folding table, listening to the hum of the fluorescent lights while her mother mopped.
She had read her first law book in that basement. She had decided, in that basement, that she would one day walk through the front door of that building and never leave through the back.
Eight months ago, she had been appointed to the federal bench. At 46, she became the first Black woman to serve as a federal judge in this district.
The appointment had not been welcomed by everyone.
Chief Judge Harold Sutton, who had run the district for 19 years, had lobbied openly for another candidate. A former prosecutor with deep ties to the police union and a record of ruling in favor of law enforcement.
When Naomi's name came down from Washington instead, Sutton had sent a polite congratulatory email, and then spent the next three months finding reasons to assign her the most difficult, most politically explosive cases on the docket.
Including this one.
Case 2024-CR-0318. United States versus Officers Derek Voss and Shane Pruitt.
The case had been transferred to her district after two local judges recused themselves, citing personal relationships with the defendants.
On paper, Naomi's assignment made sense. She had no prior connections to Voss or Pruitt. She had no ties to the Columbus Police Department. She was, by every legal definition, the cleanest possible choice.
Sutton had assigned her the case believing she was the most pressurable choice. A new judge, eight months on the bench, no political capital, no established alliances. He expected her to feel the weight of the department's opposition and find a quiet way to step aside.
He had underestimated her so completely that it almost wasn't interesting.
Naomi reviewed the case files over coffee at her kitchen table.
Voss and Pruitt had been charged with civil rights violations under color of law. Three separate incidents, three separate victims, all Black men, all documented with video evidence that the department had initially claimed didn't exist.
The youngest victim was 17 years old. He had needed reconstructive surgery on his jaw.
She closed the folder and set it inside her briefcase beside the rest of the day's materials.