Investiture of Judge Hooks invokes career accolades

By Stephen Anderson

“This is an extraordinary day,” said Supreme Court Justice Thomas R. Fitzgerald, concluding the Aug. 4 investiture ceremony at which William H. Hooks became a judge of Cook County Circuit Court.

Recalling accolades given that day by colleagues of the new judge, however, Fitzgerald warned they might make a person “think you’re smarter than you were,” and it’s so easy to go wrong.

The justice suggested wearing the judicial robe as “a cloak of humility” and to make a commitment to always hear the other side.

Previous speakers had alluded to Hooks’ sense of fairness, in addition to integrity and respect for the profession. “No matter how thin the pancake, it always has two sides,” said Charles L. Nesbit, president of the Chicago chapter of the Federal Bar Association, an office Hooks once held.

Zeophus J. Williams, president of the Cook County Bar Association, as Hooks also was, noted that his criminal defense clients ran a full range of “white collar, blue collar and no collar.”

She recalled a relevant quip from the late R. Eugene Pincham: There is little difference between intellect and intuition, but a major difference between intelligence and wisdom.

Hooks, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel, also drew praise from no less than the deputy commandant, Lt. Gen. Ronald S. Coleman, who called him a “genuine American hero.”

“If you have integrity, nothing else matters,” Coleman said, mentioning that Hooks’ service resume contains four or five years marked “classified.”

Cook County Public Defender Edwin A. Burnette cited his experience with Hooks on a Marine Corp defense team at Quantico. They won 75 percent of their cases before the Marines broke up the team.

Four federal judges – Joel M. Flaum, Marvin E. Aspen, Charles P. Kocoras and Blanche M. Manning – made brief comments. Flaum called Hooks a “great symbol for the legal community.”

Aspen recalled that Hooks’ first job after graduating in 1981 from the Chicago-Kent College of Law was as a law clerk to Judge James B. Parsons, for whom the ceremonial federal courtroom was renamed in 1995.

Among other speakers were Appellate Justice P. Scott Neville, chair of the Illinois Judicial Council; Judge E. Kenneth Wright Jr., president of the Chicago Bar Association, and Chief Judge Timothy C. Evans.