In 1999, law professor Robert Edward Shepherd Jr., a national leader and advocate in legal issues affecting children and families, was the first person inducted into the Virginia Juvenile Court Hall of Fame.
"He was one of the last of a generation of legal giants in Virginia," said Ronald J. Bacigal, a colleague at the University of Richmond, where Mr. Shepherd began teaching in 1978 and continued after retiring in 2001.
"He taught. He wrote. He did a lot of service to the community.
"He influenced all of juvenile justice legislation in Virginia for 30 years. He trained a lot of juvenile court judges."
Mr. Shepherd, a 71-year-old Richmond native and resident who earned bachelor's and law degrees from Washington and Lee University, died of cancer Thursday at his home.
At his death, he was a visiting professor at his alma mater for the fall semester and had missed only two classes. A memorial service will be held Monday at 1 p.m. at River Road Church, Baptist, River and Ridge roads in Henrico County, where he taught Sunday school for 36 years.
In 1961, he wrote a paper for the Washington and Lee Law Review supporting a law that would hold parents of children born out of wedlock financially responsible for them. It became a draft of Virginia's first statute on child abuse and set the course for his career.
After a stint in the Army's Judge Advocate General's Corps, he went into private practice in Richmond.
In 1971, he joined the Virginia Attorney General's Office, where he represented the state's Division of Youth Services, the precursor of today's Department of Juvenile Justice.
He was a prime architect of the 1977 revision of the state juvenile code and of the state's statutes on special education and child abuse and neglect.
After he began teaching full time at the University of Baltimore, he came to UR in 1978.
Twice the recipient of UR's Distinguished Educator Award, "he knew so much and made [law] interesting," Bacigal said. "He would tell them [students] how he had influenced the General Assembly to pass a statute and why."
A founder of the UR law school's National Center for Family Law and a member of its board, Mr. Shepherd was sought after as an expert in courts, before legislative committees and in legal forums across the nation on issues related to children's rights.
He served as an advocate for children as a board member of the Action Alliance for Virginia's Children and Youth, as former chairman of the American Bar Association's Juvenile Justice Committee and as an ABA columnist on juvenile law.
He had served as a reporter on family law and contracts for the Virginia Court of Appeals and had headed the Virginia Bar Association's Committee on the Needs of Children.
Among numerous plaudits, he received the Child Advocacy Award from the National Association of Counsel for Children.
"The Commonwealth of Virginia has lost one of its most dedicated advocates for youth, and our court has lost a tremendous and inspiring spirit," said Angela Edwards Roberts, chief judge of Richmond's Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court. The courthouse will pause for a moment of silence tomorrow at noon in Mr. Shepherd's honor.
Survivors include his wife, Nancy Baker Shepherd; a son, Robert E. Shepherd III of Powhatan; two daughters, Sharon Shepherd of Powhatan and Stephanie Shepherd of Ames, Iowa; two stepdaughters, Kara Bleecher of Richmond and Courtney Barrett of Staunton; his mother, Mildred Shepherd of Richmond; a sister, Susan Eacho of Jacksonville, Fla.; a brother, Walter Shepherd of Raleigh, N.C.; and four grandchildren and one stepgrandchild.
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