'You have to let go,' Long-time Summit County Probate Judge Bill Spicer dies at 81

During the 31 years Bill Spicer served as Summit County’s probate court judge, he made decisions in many high-profile end-of-life cases.

Spicer also spearheaded a revamping of Ohio’s guardianship laws.

So, it’s not surprising that Spicer had decided in advance how he wanted to spend his last days, laying out his wishes in documents that have now become the standard.

“That guided me in my decision making,” said Greg Peacock, Spicer’s husband and partner of more than 25 years. “We have that because of him.”

Spicer, 81, died at his home Sunday after a lengthy illness.

He received his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Akron, where he joined the ROTC before serving in the U.S. Army during Vietnam.

Spicer, who was a Republican, was an assistant U.S. attorney, Akron law director and Akron Municipal Court judge before being appointed the probate judge in 1980. He served in that role, prevailing in several tough election challenges, until he retired in 2011.

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Spicer was among three people in his family to serve as a judge in Summit County.

Bill Spicer’s grandfather, H.C. Spicer, became Summit County’s first juvenile court judge in the 1920s.

Mary Spicer, Bill’s cousin, retired in 2009 after 24 years as a common pleas court judge. She was the first woman to serve in the common pleas court that is now made up of only female judges.

Spicer, who took over for Judge James Barbuto, kept Mary Spicer on as a magistrate in probate court, where she served for three years before being elected judge.

“I never heard one word about nepotism,” Mary Spicer said. “The relationship was really good.”

Mary said Bill was the last of the family to serve as judge, with no younger Spicers interested in this career path. She said Bill, who was a history buff, was working on a book about the family’s history that he never finished.

“I said to him, ‘Who wants to read about that?’” she recalled. “He thought they did. So, fine.”

Spicer makes mark with end-of-life rulings and guardianship law

Spicer made many tough rulings during his three decades on the bench.

Months into his first term, he became the first probate judge in Ohio to approve a request to remove a terminally ill patient from life support. He did so under threats from the county coroner of labeling the death a homicide and protests from outside groups.

Spicer’s ruling led to a 10-year legal battle to get a living-will law passed in Ohio. It was also cited in a footnote in a 1990 U.S. Supreme Court life-support decision.

In another pivotal decision, Spicer approved a medical doctor’s request to remove Aiden Stein, a Mansfield child left brain damaged by an abusive father, from life support in 2004. The Ohio Supreme Court overturned the ruling, placing the decision in the parents’ hands. The boy died in 2016 after a decade on life support.

On the eve of his retirement in 2011, Spicer told the Beacon Journal that he learned to live with the tough decisions he had to make.

“I’m sure there are some cases where you question your decisions; you’d be less than human not to,” he said. “Eventually, though, you have to let go.”

Bob Rischitelli, who served as Spicer’s judicial attorney for many years and is now a probate attorney, said Spicer did his research and arrived at his decisions without politics weighing into the picture. He said it wasn’t anything besides “the facts and the law.”

“I think he had a great understanding of empathy and compassion, with a respect for the law,” Rischitelli said. “He saw ahead of his time the human side of the law.”

In the early 1990s, Spicer led efforts to reform Ohio’s guardianship laws, which allow individuals to take over the affairs of citizens unable to care for themselves.

Rischetelli said Spicer foresaw that there would be an increased need for guardianships as people began to live longer, requiring loved ones more often to step in to help with their care.

“He saw these things that were balancing the rights of those thought to be incompetent and other people’s rights wanting to help — help, and sometimes not in a great way,” Rischetelli said.

Spicer helped jump start many careers

Spicer helped the careers of many people who went on to serve in higher political offices or appointed positions.

The long list includes Maureen O’Connor, who served as a magistrate in probate court and went on to be lieutenant governor and then Ohio Supreme Court chief justice, U.S. District Court Judge John Adams, and Summit County Common Pleas judges Alison McCarty and Mary Margaret Rowlands.

"He was a true leader in the area of probate law and an example to everybody, certainly for me, by the way he approached the operations of the court and the responsibility he felt in administrating justice and administrating the court," O'Connor told the Beacon Journal in 2011.

Bryan Williams, the Summit County GOP chairman, also worked in probate court for two years right out of college.

“One of the things he enjoyed and took great pride in was helping people get their start,” Williams said. “I’m happy to be one of them.”

Williams said Spicer told him he had a great political acumen and would one day be the county party chairman. He said this wasn’t in his thinking at the time, especially with longtime GOP chairman Alex Arshinkoff still helming the party at that point.

“That was his prophecy,” said Williams, who became chairman in 2014.

Spicer enjoyed supporting Zips in his later years

After his retirement, Spicer enjoyed attending UA basketball and football games and rooting for his beloved Zips.

Peacock said they would go to games and UA would be down by 10 points and he’d suggest that they leave. Spicer, though, would insist that they stay until the end — and the team would often pull off a win.

“It was such a huge part of our lives,” said Peacock, who is an assistant Summit County prosecutor. “He was always motivated. No matter how he felt, if there was a Zips game, he was up and ready.”

Spicer and Peacock have a UA athletic scholarship in their families’ names and recently sponsored a UA basketball retreat in Puerto Rico.

UA basketball coach John Groce called Bill while he was in hospice, giving him a pep talk.

“You have a toughness,” Groce told him. “You have a great attitude and you help others.”

“That meant a lot,” Peacock said of the coach’s call.

Peacock said a private service for Spicer will be held for family and friends at Western Star Cemetery in Norton, where many of Spicer’s ancestors — dating back to the Revolutionary War — were laid to rest. A date hasn’t been set.

Stephanie Warsmith can be reached at swarsmith@thebeaconjournal.co, 330-996-3705 and on Twitter: @swarsmithabj.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Longtime Summit County probate judge Bill Spicer dies at 81