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Created page with "{{Infobox officeholder |name=David Adolph Berchelmann, Jr. |nationality=American |office= Judge of the Texas 290th District Court (Bexar County) |party=..."
{{Infobox officeholder
|name=David Adolph Berchelmann, Jr.
|nationality=[[United States|American]]
|office= [[Judge]] of the Texas 290th District Court (Bexar County)
|party=[[Republican Party|Republican]]
|term_start=1981
|term_end=1989
|preceded=New position
|succeeded=
|office2=Judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
|term_start2=1989
|term_end2=1990
|office3=Judge of the Texas 37th District Court (Bexar County)
|term_start3=1993
|term_end3=2012
|preceded3=Ann-Marie Cerda Aaron
|succeeded3=Michael Mery
|birth_place=[[San Antonio]], [[Texas]], USA
|birth_date=July 14, 1947
|occupation=[[Attorney]], mediator<br>
Retired judge
|residence=San Antonio, Texas
|religion=[[Roman Catholic]]
|spouse=Dona Becker Berchelmann
|children=Ashley, Shelby, and David, III<br>
'''Parents''':<br>
David, Sr., and Nancye Doles Berchelmann
|alma_mater=St. Mary's University<br>
St. Mary's University School of Law (both in San Antonio)}}
'''David Adolph Berchelmann, Jr.''' (born July 14, 1947),<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.txdirectory.com/online/person/?id=21963|title=David Berchelmann, Jr. (R)|publisher=txdirectory.com|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref> is a retired [[judge]] from his native [[San Antonio]], [[Texas]]. A [[Republican Party|Republican]], he served briefly on the statewide nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals but for twenty-eight years in two district courts in populous Bexar County.
==Background==
Berchlemann is the son of an obstetrician, David Berchelmann, Sr. (1919-2007), a graduate of the Saint Louis University School of Medicine who was a physician in the United States Navy during World War II, and the former Nancye Doles . His grandfather, Adolph George Berchelmann, I (1885-1964), was also a physician. His brother is Adolph G. Berchelmann, III, of San Antonio; another brother, George Michael Berchelmann, is deceased. He has four sisters, Constance Joy Allovio of Hewitt in McLennan County, Texas; Nancye Theresa Flasch of San Antonio; Mary Ellen Tallerico of Edmond, [[Oklahoma]], and Penny Anne Muller of [[Denver]], [[Colorado]]. Berchelmann and his wife, the former Dona Becker (born 1947), have three children, Ashley, Shelby, and David Berchelmann, III.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.porterloring.com/memsol.cgi?user_id=458926|title=Dr. David Adolph Berchelmann, Sr.|publisher=porterloring.com|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref>
In 1970, Berchelmann received a Bachelor of Arts degree in [[History]] and [[Government]] from St. Mary's University in San Antonio, of which in 2011, he was named an "Outstanding Graduate." He procured his law degree in 1973 from St. Mary's School of Law.<ref name=bio/>
==Career==
From 1973 to 1980, Berchelmann was an associate in the San Antonio law firm of Thurmond & Clark and an assistant district attorney for Bexar County. In 1981, [[Governor]] [[Bill Clements]] appointed Berchelmann judge of the newly established 290th District Court in Bexar County.<ref name=bio>{{cite web|url=http://www.namanhowell.com/attorneys/berchelmann-hon-david-ret/|title=Berchelmann, Hon. David (Ret.)|publisher=namanhowell.com|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref> That same year, Clements named another Republican, [[Tom Rickhoff]], judge of the newly created 289th District Court and the Republican [[David Peeples]] to the 285th District Court. In 1982, Berchelmann, Rickhoff, Peeples, and a fourth Republican, [[Roy Barrera, Jr.]], were the first Republicans ever elected to district court judgeships in Bexar County; their victories came despite Clements' defeat for reelection in the gubernatorial election at the hands of the [[Democratic Party Democrat]] [[Mark White]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bexargop.org/history.php|title=History of the Republican Party of Bexar County|publisher=bexargop.org|accessdate=March 4, 2015; material no longer accessible on-line}}</ref> Rickhoff, later judge of the [[Texas Courts of Appeals|Texas Court of Appeals for the 4th District]], has been since 2001 a judge of the [[probate court]] in Bexar County and like Berchelmann an alumnus of both St. Mary's and its law school.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://tomrickhoff.blogspot.com/2009/08/judge-rickhoffs-bio.html|title=Judge Rickhoff's Bio|publisher=tomrickhoff.blogspot.com|date=August 5, 2009|date=March 2, 2015}}</ref>
In his first month on the 290th Court, Berchelmann held the entire San Antonio City Council in [[contempt of court]] after the governing body allegedly annexed two subdivisions in conflict with a previous court order. He fined each member $500 until the vote was retracted. According to Berchelmann, the council members "did something they were told they couldn't do. ... both sides got together and resolved it after I caught all the grief."<ref name=saen/>
In 1989, Governor Clements in his second nonconsecutive term appointed Berchelmann as the first Republican to serve on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in more than a century. Berchelmann was defeated the next year in his bid for a full term on the appeals court. In the same election, the Democrat [[Ann Richards]] won the governorship over Republican Clayton Wheat Williams, Jr. (1931-2020) Berchelmann later said that his loss was a "blessing" because he found that he preferred district court trial work to sitting in three-judge panels for appeals. The Court of Criminal Appeals has since become all Republican.<ref>{{cite web|url=|publisher=''San Antonio Express-News''|author=Craig Kapitan|date=January 2, 2013|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref>
In the 1992 [[general election]], Berchelmann was elected judge of the Texas 37th District Court in Bexar County, having narrowly unseated the Democratic incumbent, Ann-Marie Cerda Aaron, 187,681 votes (50.6 percent) to 183,588 (49.5 percent).<ref>Texas Secretary of State, Election Returns, November 3, 1992.</ref>
One of Berchelmann's most visible cases was in 2009, when as 37th District judge he was named "special master" over an ethics hearing involving Court of Criminal Appeals Chief Justice [[Sharon Keller]] of [[Dallas]]. He told ''The San Antonio Express-News'': "None of it's ever easy. ... We affect somebody's life."<ref name=saen/> Berchelmann ruled that "there is a valid reason why many in the legal community are not proud of Judge Keller's actions." However, he said that she had violated no law or ethical rule, and recommended no further sanction against her "beyond the public humiliation she has surely suffered".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.scjc.state.tx.us/pdf/skeller/MastersFindings.pdf|title=Special Master's Findings of Fact|accessdateFebruary 14, 2010}}</ref>
Berchelmann remained on the 37th District Court until January 2013. He did not seek a sixth term in 2012. A Democrat, Michael Mery, defeated Art Rossi, who had been unopposed as the Republican nominee to succeed Berchelmann. Mery polled 267,338 votes (54 percent); Rossi, 227,401 (46 percent).<ref>Texas Secretary of State, Election Returns, November 6, 2012.</ref> In 2013, as he stepped down, Judge Berchelmann advised new judges: "Be open-minded and be as fair as [you] possibly can. Just listen. There's less black and white the longer you've done this."<ref name=saen/>
After he left the bench, Berchelmann joined the law firm of Naman, Howell, Smith & Lee, in which he maintains a mediation practice. He is also a visiting judge on call. Berchelmann is a past president of the Catholic Lawyers Guild and has served on the boards of St. Mary's University Alumni Association, the Downtown San Antonio [[YMCA]], Alamo Kiwanis International, and the St. Mary’s Youth Drop-In Center.<ref name=bio/>
Upon his death, Berchelmann will be interred at the Texas State Cemetery in [[Austin]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cemetery.state.tx.us/pub/user_form.asp?pers_id=6090|title=David Adolph Berchelmann|publisher=cemetery.state.tx.us|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref> His father and grandfather are interred at San Fernando Cemetery No. 2 in San Antonio.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gsr&GSfn=&GSmn=&GSln=Berchelmann&GSbyrel=all&GSby=&GSdyrel=all&GSdy=&GScntry=4&GSst=46&GScnty=2534&GSgrid=&df=all&GSob=n|title=Berchelmann
|publisher=findagrave.com|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Berchelmann, David}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Attorneys]]
[[Category:Judges]]
[[Category:Republicans]]
[[Category:Catholics]]
|name=David Adolph Berchelmann, Jr.
|nationality=[[United States|American]]
|office= [[Judge]] of the Texas 290th District Court (Bexar County)
|party=[[Republican Party|Republican]]
|term_start=1981
|term_end=1989
|preceded=New position
|succeeded=
|office2=Judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals
|term_start2=1989
|term_end2=1990
|office3=Judge of the Texas 37th District Court (Bexar County)
|term_start3=1993
|term_end3=2012
|preceded3=Ann-Marie Cerda Aaron
|succeeded3=Michael Mery
|birth_place=[[San Antonio]], [[Texas]], USA
|birth_date=July 14, 1947
|occupation=[[Attorney]], mediator<br>
Retired judge
|residence=San Antonio, Texas
|religion=[[Roman Catholic]]
|spouse=Dona Becker Berchelmann
|children=Ashley, Shelby, and David, III<br>
'''Parents''':<br>
David, Sr., and Nancye Doles Berchelmann
|alma_mater=St. Mary's University<br>
St. Mary's University School of Law (both in San Antonio)}}
'''David Adolph Berchelmann, Jr.''' (born July 14, 1947),<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.txdirectory.com/online/person/?id=21963|title=David Berchelmann, Jr. (R)|publisher=txdirectory.com|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref> is a retired [[judge]] from his native [[San Antonio]], [[Texas]]. A [[Republican Party|Republican]], he served briefly on the statewide nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals but for twenty-eight years in two district courts in populous Bexar County.
==Background==
Berchlemann is the son of an obstetrician, David Berchelmann, Sr. (1919-2007), a graduate of the Saint Louis University School of Medicine who was a physician in the United States Navy during World War II, and the former Nancye Doles . His grandfather, Adolph George Berchelmann, I (1885-1964), was also a physician. His brother is Adolph G. Berchelmann, III, of San Antonio; another brother, George Michael Berchelmann, is deceased. He has four sisters, Constance Joy Allovio of Hewitt in McLennan County, Texas; Nancye Theresa Flasch of San Antonio; Mary Ellen Tallerico of Edmond, [[Oklahoma]], and Penny Anne Muller of [[Denver]], [[Colorado]]. Berchelmann and his wife, the former Dona Becker (born 1947), have three children, Ashley, Shelby, and David Berchelmann, III.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.porterloring.com/memsol.cgi?user_id=458926|title=Dr. David Adolph Berchelmann, Sr.|publisher=porterloring.com|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref>
In 1970, Berchelmann received a Bachelor of Arts degree in [[History]] and [[Government]] from St. Mary's University in San Antonio, of which in 2011, he was named an "Outstanding Graduate." He procured his law degree in 1973 from St. Mary's School of Law.<ref name=bio/>
==Career==
From 1973 to 1980, Berchelmann was an associate in the San Antonio law firm of Thurmond & Clark and an assistant district attorney for Bexar County. In 1981, [[Governor]] [[Bill Clements]] appointed Berchelmann judge of the newly established 290th District Court in Bexar County.<ref name=bio>{{cite web|url=http://www.namanhowell.com/attorneys/berchelmann-hon-david-ret/|title=Berchelmann, Hon. David (Ret.)|publisher=namanhowell.com|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref> That same year, Clements named another Republican, [[Tom Rickhoff]], judge of the newly created 289th District Court and the Republican [[David Peeples]] to the 285th District Court. In 1982, Berchelmann, Rickhoff, Peeples, and a fourth Republican, [[Roy Barrera, Jr.]], were the first Republicans ever elected to district court judgeships in Bexar County; their victories came despite Clements' defeat for reelection in the gubernatorial election at the hands of the [[Democratic Party Democrat]] [[Mark White]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bexargop.org/history.php|title=History of the Republican Party of Bexar County|publisher=bexargop.org|accessdate=March 4, 2015; material no longer accessible on-line}}</ref> Rickhoff, later judge of the [[Texas Courts of Appeals|Texas Court of Appeals for the 4th District]], has been since 2001 a judge of the [[probate court]] in Bexar County and like Berchelmann an alumnus of both St. Mary's and its law school.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://tomrickhoff.blogspot.com/2009/08/judge-rickhoffs-bio.html|title=Judge Rickhoff's Bio|publisher=tomrickhoff.blogspot.com|date=August 5, 2009|date=March 2, 2015}}</ref>
In his first month on the 290th Court, Berchelmann held the entire San Antonio City Council in [[contempt of court]] after the governing body allegedly annexed two subdivisions in conflict with a previous court order. He fined each member $500 until the vote was retracted. According to Berchelmann, the council members "did something they were told they couldn't do. ... both sides got together and resolved it after I caught all the grief."<ref name=saen/>
In 1989, Governor Clements in his second nonconsecutive term appointed Berchelmann as the first Republican to serve on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in more than a century. Berchelmann was defeated the next year in his bid for a full term on the appeals court. In the same election, the Democrat [[Ann Richards]] won the governorship over Republican Clayton Wheat Williams, Jr. (1931-2020) Berchelmann later said that his loss was a "blessing" because he found that he preferred district court trial work to sitting in three-judge panels for appeals. The Court of Criminal Appeals has since become all Republican.<ref>{{cite web|url=|publisher=''San Antonio Express-News''|author=Craig Kapitan|date=January 2, 2013|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref>
In the 1992 [[general election]], Berchelmann was elected judge of the Texas 37th District Court in Bexar County, having narrowly unseated the Democratic incumbent, Ann-Marie Cerda Aaron, 187,681 votes (50.6 percent) to 183,588 (49.5 percent).<ref>Texas Secretary of State, Election Returns, November 3, 1992.</ref>
One of Berchelmann's most visible cases was in 2009, when as 37th District judge he was named "special master" over an ethics hearing involving Court of Criminal Appeals Chief Justice [[Sharon Keller]] of [[Dallas]]. He told ''The San Antonio Express-News'': "None of it's ever easy. ... We affect somebody's life."<ref name=saen/> Berchelmann ruled that "there is a valid reason why many in the legal community are not proud of Judge Keller's actions." However, he said that she had violated no law or ethical rule, and recommended no further sanction against her "beyond the public humiliation she has surely suffered".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.scjc.state.tx.us/pdf/skeller/MastersFindings.pdf|title=Special Master's Findings of Fact|accessdateFebruary 14, 2010}}</ref>
Berchelmann remained on the 37th District Court until January 2013. He did not seek a sixth term in 2012. A Democrat, Michael Mery, defeated Art Rossi, who had been unopposed as the Republican nominee to succeed Berchelmann. Mery polled 267,338 votes (54 percent); Rossi, 227,401 (46 percent).<ref>Texas Secretary of State, Election Returns, November 6, 2012.</ref> In 2013, as he stepped down, Judge Berchelmann advised new judges: "Be open-minded and be as fair as [you] possibly can. Just listen. There's less black and white the longer you've done this."<ref name=saen/>
After he left the bench, Berchelmann joined the law firm of Naman, Howell, Smith & Lee, in which he maintains a mediation practice. He is also a visiting judge on call. Berchelmann is a past president of the Catholic Lawyers Guild and has served on the boards of St. Mary's University Alumni Association, the Downtown San Antonio [[YMCA]], Alamo Kiwanis International, and the St. Mary’s Youth Drop-In Center.<ref name=bio/>
Upon his death, Berchelmann will be interred at the Texas State Cemetery in [[Austin]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cemetery.state.tx.us/pub/user_form.asp?pers_id=6090|title=David Adolph Berchelmann|publisher=cemetery.state.tx.us|accessdate=March 4, 2015}}</ref> His father and grandfather are interred at San Fernando Cemetery No. 2 in San Antonio.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gsr&GSfn=&GSmn=&GSln=Berchelmann&GSbyrel=all&GSby=&GSdyrel=all&GSdy=&GScntry=4&GSst=46&GScnty=2534&GSgrid=&df=all&GSob=n|title=Berchelmann
|publisher=findagrave.com|accessdate=March 3, 2015}}</ref>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Berchelmann, David}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Attorneys]]
[[Category:Judges]]
[[Category:Republicans]]
[[Category:Catholics]]