The Kind of Judge I Want to Be: Going the Extra Mile

I handle a lot of family law cases in my private practice.  It's hard to watch couples going through divorce and custody battles where there are almost never true "winners".  On one occasion, I went with a client to the courthouse to try to resolve such a dispute, but instead of meeting in the courtroom, everyone concerned had agreed to meet for a settlement conference with the judge first.  We began at about 10 am and finally resolved all of the necessary issues by about 9 pm.  Our devoted judge had stayed four hours after the courthouse closed. There was no extra pay involved, but because of that extra effort, each of the opposing parties left with a much greater satisfaction with the settlement.  They had saved perhaps thousands of dollars in court costs and were much less likely to return to the court at a later date to dispute the results--A winning situation in a domestic relations case thanks to a committed judge.  That's the kind of judge I want to be.