NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee Appellate Judge Charles D. Susano Jr. is retiring from the bench this spring.

Susano will retire from the bench effective April 30, the state Supreme Court said in a news release Monday.

Susano told Gov. Bill Lee by letter that his service “has been the highest honor of my life.”

Susano, of Knoxville, was appointed to the Court of Appeals in 1994 by Gov. Ned Ray McWherter, then elected statewide that same year. He was reelected in 1998, 2006 and 2014 and was presiding judge of the court from 2012 to 2014.

Susano graduated from law school at the University of Tennessee in 1963 after serving in the Army, then was in the inaugural group of law clerks to the Tennessee Supreme Court, working for then-Chief Justice Hamilton Burnett.