Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, December 24, 1994 TAG: 9412270093
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: WYTHEVILLE LENGTH: Medium
Circuit Judge Willis A. Woods of Wytheville, one of four 27th Judicial Circuit judges, has announced that he will retire from the bench in March.
The bar considered Slavin and Trenton G. Crewe Jr., Wytheville's mayor, for the endorsement. Its members voted Wednesday by secret ballot and, when it was announced that Slavin had a majority, voted again to endorse him unanimously.
Slavin said Friday he felt grateful and humbled by his colleagues' endorsement. ``Truly, that's the most gratifying thing about the whole process,'' he said.
The district covers the counties of Bland, Carroll, Floyd, Giles, Grayson, Montgomery, Pulaski and Wythe, and the cities of Galax and Radford.
Woods usually presides in cases being heard in Wythe, Bland and Grayson counties. The Grayson County Bar will meet Thursday to make its endorsement.
Mickey Newberry is the only lawyer who actually lives in Bland County, and Slavin said she had told him she would support him. Slavin said he had not met with representatives of bar associations in the other localities, because there would be little point in doing so if he did not get his local bar's endorsement.
He has written letters of his interest in the judgeship to legislators representing parts of the circuit in the General Assembly, where the appointment will be made.
Slavin joined the Wytheville law practice of Daniel W. Bird Jr. in 1976, a year after he graduated from the Washington and Lee School of Law. He had been a clerk for one year in Portsmouth for a Virginia Supreme Court justice.
Slavin worked as a police officer in Holly Hill, Fla., from 1969 to 1972 before starting law school.
Slavin said his interest in the circuit bench began about three years ago after his appointment as a substitute general district judge. He knew he would seek an appointment eventually, ``it's just that `eventually' happened a whole lot earlier than I'd planned,'' he said.
For eight years, he has been an escheator for Bland and Wythe counties and, for about nine years, one of two commissioners of accounts for Wythe County. He and his wife, Kathryne, have two sons, Frank III, 14, and Bill, 12.
by CNB