40 Years Of Service Welch Retires As Cass County Public Defender by Maria Nagle
A
fter 40 years as a public servant in Cass County – first as state’s attorney, judge, and then public defender – Robert Welch ’69 retired on May 31. He does not plan on giving up practicing law. “John Endres was the public defender, and he died within a year of my retiring as judge, and I basically said I would do it for a while,” Welch says. “I figured 10 years as a public defender is more than enough.” The SIU Alumni Association member says he stayed for a decade in that Robert Welch role because “I actually enjoyed it. I enjoyed representing people and going to court. The other side of the coin was I wasn’t ready to retire. I thought I was doing a service to the people of Cass County and at the same time I was getting a lot of experience in the courtroom as a judge.” Welch retired in July 2003 after serving 25 years as 8th Judicial Circuit Court judge. During his tenure on the court bench he
46
served for 10 years as chief judge of the judicial circuit. After four decades in public service Welch will be returning solely to the private practice of law – which is where he intended to start his law career. Welch, originally from the Chicago area, attended Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and the University of Illinois Law School. He came to Cass County in 1972 after being hired at a Beardstown law firm, but he was recruited by the Democratic Party to run for state’s attorney. He won as a write-in candidate just two weeks after being notified that he had passed the bar exam. He operates his own law firm now, in association with Nolan Lipsky, on the south side of Virginia’s square. “I enjoy being a lawyer,” Welch notes. “This way I keep active. I’ve known too many judges, in particular, who have retired and died within one or two years. I think you have to remain active and you might as well remain active doing what you enjoy, and I enjoy practicing law.” He says his transition from judge to public defender was simple enough. “The difference is getting used to the fact that when you walk into the courtroom nobody stands up – things like that,” Welch says, chuckling. “Although, I still get treated
pretty well.” As a public defender he got to learn about the lives of the defendants and understand more about from where they were coming. “As a judge, you only see them in court,” Welch says. “As a public defender and defense attorney, you get to meet them and their families and you see them more as humans being with all of their idiosyncrasies, as opposed to just seeing them in front of you in handcuffs.” Welch says the most frustrating or aggravating thing about being a public defender is the bum rap they get, especially on TV police and crime shows. “The TV shows all put public defenders in a bad light,” he says. “They really put them down and that carries over to the public. I have had people say, ‘I’m going to get a real attorney.’ I tell them, ‘I’ve only got 40 years of experience, but if you want to get a real attorney, go ahead.’” The public defenders Welch knows “are all hardworking, well-educated, great attorneys who think they are basically on a mission to help people,” he notes. “The public defenders are, in effect, the guardians of the freedom for people who don’t have any money and can’t afford an attorney.” ■ – Maria Nagle is a writer for the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, where this story first appeared.
Southern Alumni