Judge Walton was born in Donora, Pennsylvania.  He graduated from West Virginia State University in 1971, where he was a three-year letterman on the football team and played on the 1968 nationally ranked conference championship team.  Judge Walton received his law degree from the American University, Washington College of Law, in 1974.

Judge Walton assumed his current position as a U.S. District Judge for the District of Columbia in 2001.  He was also appointed by President George W. Bush in 2004 as the Chair of the National Prison Rape Elimination Commission, a commission created by Congress to identify methods to curb the incidents of prison rape.  The U.S. Attorney General substantially adopted the Commission’s recommendations for implementation in federal prisons; other federal, state and local officials throughout the country are considering adopting the recommendations.  Former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist appointed Judge Walton to the federal judiciary’s Criminal Law Committee in 2005, on which he served until 2011.  In 2007, Chief Justice John Roberts appointed Judge Walton to a 7-year term as a Judge of the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, and he was subsequently appointed Presiding Judge in 2013.  He completed his term on that court on May 18, 2014.  Upon completion of his appointment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, Chief Justice John Roberts appointed Judge Walton to serve as a member of the Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management.