On November 21, 2017, J. Douglas Overbey was administered the oath of office to become United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee after being nominated by President Donald J. Trump and confirmed by the United States Senate. As the chief federal law enforcement officer in East Tennessee, Overbey leads an office of approximately 60 Assistant U.S. Attorneys and a like number of support staff with its headquarters in Knoxville and branch offices in Greeneville and Chattanooga.
Overbey received his undergraduate degree, magna cum laude, from Carson-Newman College in 1976 and graduated first in his class in 1979 from the University of Tennessee, College of Law, where he received the Order of the Coif. Overbey has practiced law for over 40 years, and, in 1982, co-founded the Knoxville law firm of Robertson Overbey.
Prior to his appointment as U.S. Attorney, Overbey was serving his third term in the Tennessee State Senate, representing Blount and Sevier counties. From 2000 to 2008, he represented a portion of Blount County in the House of Representatives.
Overbey served on the Finance and Health Committees in both the House and Senate, was Chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee and the General Assembly’s Arts Caucus, and Vice-Chairman of the Senate Finance and Judiciary Committees. His major legislative accomplishments include passage of the innovative TNInvestco program, which became a model for similar legislation in other states, and the annual Tennessee hospital assessment, maintaining funding for state’s Medicaid program. He was also the prime Senate sponsor of Governor Haslam’s Insure Tennessee proposal.
Among his awards and honors, Overbey received the 2011 Bud Cramer Award from the National Children’s Alliance, the 2012 Distinguished Alumnus Award from Carson-Newman University, the 2017 Presidential Award from the Tennessee Judicial Conference, and the Knoxville Bar Association’s “Law through Liberty” Award in 2009. He was inducted into the Blount County Hall of Fame in 2016, and, in 2011 he received the Community Leadership Award from Leadership Blount.
In addition to his duties as U.S. Attorney, Overbey currently serves as Chairman of the Tennessee Dangerous Drug Task Force and the Executive Board for the Appalachian High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area.
Overbey resides in Maryville with his wife, Kay. They have three daughters and sons-in-law, four grandchildren, and two foster grandchildren. Kay and Doug are parishioners of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Maryville. Doug served ten years as Chancellor of the Episcopal Diocese of East Tennessee, is the only layperson to have served as Chairman of the Diocese’s Standing Committee, and has had two articles published in The Anglican Digest.