Page 30 - Delaware Lawyer -Spring 2021

FEATURE
Chuck Durante
OF COUNSEL: Judge Richard S. Gebelein
As Judge Richard S. Gebelein exited the Public Building one afternoon in the 1990s, a rough-hewn voice came from across the long steps of the former court house: “I see you every day.”
Having sentenced hundreds of men over the previous decade, Gebelein was prepared for anything.
“I’m working on this building next to the court house,” said the man, pointing to Bracebridge, the nine-story high-budget tower under construction by MBNA. “I work steel.”
Gebelein recognized the man, and recalled his story. As a boy, the man had rescued someone from a burning building. By his late teens, he was us- ing heroin. As an adult, he faced felony charges in Superior Court. Luckily, the Superior Court had one of the nation’s pioneering drug-court programs. Over 20 months, through counseling and support, he completed the program successfully.
“Heroin addict to high skills,” re- calls Gebelein. “Pretty good.”
The creation of Delaware’s widely emulated drug court is but one legacy of R ich Gebelein’s career, which has seen him repeatedly entrusted with critical roles in the administration of justice: State Solicitor at 28, assistant public defender, Attorney General, the first Disciplinary Counsel, membership on several rules committees, two terms on the Superior Court, and a return to 820 French as Beau Biden’s initial Chief Deputy Attorney General.
Gebelein has also had a world-wide
The creation of Delaware’s widely emulated drug court is but one legacy of Rich Gebelein’s career, which
has seen him repeatedly entrusted with critical roles in the administration of justice.
impact in a way unprecedented among Delaware lawyers, undertaking as- signments to build the rule of law in Afghanistan, Bosnia and elsewhere. Amid physical danger, ethnic bitterness and logrolling cultures, he worked to establish regularity in criminal proceed- ings, adjudicated war crimes and heard government corruption cases.
Here and abroad, Gebelein’s unflap- pable focus proved his ally in the long game. Many in his generation acted as if he who spoke first or loudest would win the argument. Gebelein’s more
studied manner meant that when he spoke, people listened.
The son of a DuPonter, Gebelein attended Salesianum and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in three years as a math major. He chose Delaware after Villanova Law School and a year of clerking for Chancellor William Duffy and Superior Court judges William Quillen and Vincent Bifferato. The “utter chaos” in Phila- delphia courts convinced him to join Attorney General Laird Stabler’s staff over Arlen Specter’s Philadelphia DA’s office. Within three years, he was State Solicitor.
In 1975, Gebelein left the Attorney General’s office to be a public defender. After a two-year quest, he secured a not-guilty verdict on retrial in a notori- ous murder case, after discovering that the prosecution had promised favors for testimony from a jailhouse witness, then withheld another prisoner’s taped confession. He then joined Ernie Wil- son’s and Tom Whittington’s firm.
Gebelein shocked the state by de- feating Dick Wier in 1978 to become Attorney General. In that role, he drove a strong settlement, lauded by his pre- decessor, in a case that Wier had brought against the Nemours Foundation to enforce Alfred I. du Pont’s charitable trust. On Gov. Pete du Pont’s sentenc- ing reform commission, Gebelein and Dave Swayze developed the concept of multi-level sentencing, so not every guilty defendant would go to prison.
After one term, he was among three GOP statewide (Continued on page 27)
28 DELAWARE LAWYER SPRING 2021