Family, friends witness robing of newest supreme court justice

BANGOR – Just about anybody Andrew M. Mead has met since moving to Maine more than 30 years ago showed up Thursday morning at the Penobscot County Courthouse to watch him officially don his black robe and join the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.

Mead, 55, had already been sworn in by Gov. John Baldacci on March 22 in Augusta.

But Baldacci on Thursday administered the oath again in the packed third-floor courtroom where Mead presided over thousands of cases during his 15 years as a Superior Court justice.

With the help of his wife, Kelley [Kelly is cq], and grown children Sarah and Andrew M. Mead Jr., the justice put on the same black robe he has worn for more than a decade as family and friends snapped pictures.

“I know all of you and I’m so grateful to have you here,” Mead told the crowd of some 200 people. “This is a humbling and thrilling moment.”

Referring to the portraits of retired justices hanging on the courtroom walls, Mead said, “I’m glad to be under the watchful gaze of the justices who have come before me, especially Justice David Roberts. For me, he is the zenith” to aspire to.

Roberts died at the age of 70 in 1999, five months after retiring from the state’s high court, where he served for 18 years.

Prior to that, he served for 13 years on the Superior Court bench. Roberts’ great-grandfather, grandfather, father and brother were all lawyers, and his son, Michael Roberts, is deputy district attorney for Penobscot County.

Mead pledged to dedicate himself to “justifying the confidence” Baldacci and the state have placed in him.

Chief Justice Leigh I. Saufley praised Mead’s work with jurors throughout his years on the Superior Court bench and his work so far on the high court.

“He’s sat with us a full month,” she said. “We’ve found him to be collegial, thoroughly prepared, completely engaged and not the least bit afraid to tell us when we’ve missed the point.”

Mead, a 1973 graduate of the University of Maine, became the first judge to preside over the Penobscot Tribal Court, where he served as chief judge from 1979 to 1990.

He served as a partner at Mitchell & Stearns from 1981 to 1990 and practiced at Paine, Lynch & Weatherbee from 1976 to 1981. He served as president of the Maine State Bar Association in 1990, and was chairman of the Medical Malpractice Screening Committee from 1987 to 1990.

He was appointed by then-Gov. John McKernan to District Court in 1990. Two years later he was appointed to Superior Court.

Mead joined the court about 18 months after the governor plucked Warren Silver from private practice in Bangor to replace Justice Paul Rudman, 72, of Veazie, who retired in 2005. Silver, 59, moved into Rudman’s chambers on the third floor of the Penobscot County Courthouse in Bangor.

Although the new Penobscot County Judicial Center, to be completed in late 2009, will have offices for at least two members of the state supreme court, the current courthouse does not.

Mead will keep his office on the second floor, but the office space will be reconfigured so that his staff and Superior Court staff will not be sharing space. The $4,000 cost of the renovation will be paid for by the judiciary.

Kevin Cuddy, the Bangor attorney tapped to succeed Mead as a Superior Court justice, will use the judicial chambers on the third floor that previously were used by visiting judges and for conferences between attorneys and judges during trials.

Many local attorneys joined county and local officials for Thursday’s ceremony.

“Having both Andy Mead and Warren Silver on the [high court] bench reflects on the quality of the Penobscot County Bar,” Steven Mogul, president, said after the ceremony. “We’re very proud to have them.”