Longtime Judge Honored for Work (Tampa edition)

Longtime Judge Honored for Work (Tampa edition)

By Janet Leiser

Managing Editor

For nearly three decades, Thomas E. Penick Jr. has been called judge. And that's not likely to change later this month when Penick steps down as an official member of the Pinellas-Pasco judiciary.

Penick, who has struggled with health problems since a 2000 diagnosis with prostate cancer, has tendered his resignation, effective June 30. He was honored at a June 3 St. Petersburg Bar Association meeting.

"His greatest contributions by far have been in the field of protecting our most vulnerable citizens, seeing to their care when they are disabled or incompetent and seeing to the execution of their last wishes when they pass on," St. Petersburg Bar Association President William H. Walker said, as he presented Penick, 65, with the association's first "General of the Law" award.

In the military, Walker said, a general with five stars can go no higher. "You, sir, are a five-star general of the law," Walker told Penick.

Then-Gov. Rubin Askew appointed Penick to the county bench in 1978. At the time, Penick was president-elect of the Clearwater Bar Association. A year later, Penick was promoted to the circuit bench.

Penick, known for his white hair and bright bowties, has spent at least 14 of the past 26 years in the probate division.

"He's the father of modern probate practice in Pinellas County," Walker said.

In an April 2002 interview, Penick told GCBR he planned to retire in 2005. But he has been unable to work for the past few months because of health problems.

Born and raised in West Palm Beach, Penick is the eldest of two children. His father was a newspaper editor.

In 1960, he graduated from the University of Florida with a journalism degree. That same year he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force. He served during the Vietnam War, from 1967-68, and then joined the reserves in 1969, working in intelligence. In 1972, he obtained a law degree from Stetson University College of Law.

From the late '80s until 1994, Penick held two jobs.

"I'd jump from here (the bench) and go get in an airplane and go to work. It got to the point my wife asked me, 'Are you a judge or are you a general?' I said, 'Well, I'd better be a judge.' "

He retired as a brigadier general.

Walker said Penick brought honor to the bar as a judge and a soldier. His awards included the Distinguished Service Medal as well as the Bronze Star.

But Penick sometimes administered justice with a sense of humor. Last year, a daily newspaper wrote an article after he ordered lawyers to send court reporters flowers for talking when the court reporter couldn't record their words. The lawyers didn't complain, and neither did the court reporter.

Chief Judge David Demers, who has known Penick since law school, said in a news release: "The retirement of my friend and colleague brings to mind three characteristics that are appropriate to his life and certainly to his judicial career: committed, concerned and consumed."