By Kelly O’Brien
After serving justice for more than a decade, Judge Glenn H. Collier hung up his gavel to become a more engaged grandfather. Read more to learn about his celebrated career in the courthouse and his life after retirement and to hear a podcast featuring his advice for future generations of legal professionals.
From gavel-bearer to grandfather
A year after retiring in 2011, Judge Glenn H. Collier answered a call from a woman he didn’t recognize at first. She requested Collier’s legal services for her daughter, and he complied once he realized he had worked with this family before, eagerly agreeing to officiate the daughter’s wedding more than a decade after he approved her adoption to the woman on the phone.
Assigned to adoption court in 1995, Collier found a profession packed with happiness in his first three years as an associate judge in the 10th Judicial Circuit of Illinois.
“Adoptions—those were joys. To see this child now have a family and these parents now have a child,” he said. “I could have done adoptions every day of my career and just been perfectly happy. Those are rewarding.”
A fulfilling career in the courthouse wasn’t always in Collier’s plan. As a junior at the University of Illinois, he studied psychology until an academic advisor suggested he look at other options that interested him.
“[My academic advisor] was my savior,” he said. “I had always thought about being a lawyer, and the more I looked into it, the more I found that it sounded really interesting. I still look back and think, ‘Thank God I didn’t become a psychologist.’”
Turning his academic attention to law, he attended the University of Illinois College of Law. After graduation he headed to Peoria where he took the position of an assistant corporation counsel for the city before becoming a founding partner of the private practice Jackson, Mitchell and Collier.
The city of Peoria persuaded him to return a few years later as the corporation counsel. Throughout his time practicing law, he hoped to climb higher on the legal ladder.
“As soon as I stepped into the courtroom for the first time and went through the proceedings, I knew that I wanted to be the person sitting up there on the bench,” he said. “In my mind, in whatever you do, you should aspire to be the best, and I always felt like that was the top of the legal profession.”
Collier says he reached his professional pinnacle when he became an associate judge in 1995. Thousands of civil and criminal cases in Peoria and Tazewell counties and 14 years later, the Illinois Supreme Court appointed him as a circuit judge in 2009. With a newborn grandson living nearby and his wife’s retirement approaching, he made the bittersweet decision that this would be his last term on the bench.
As he entered the County of Peoria Courthouse three years after retiring in 2011, he seemed at home. Hugging everyone in sight and sharing stories about his grandson, he clearly considered his former co-workers family.
“They’re always smiling, they treat you with the utmost respect and they give [judges] more credit than is probably due” he said. “The bailiffs, the reporters, the clerks, all the people that help you, the attorneys…I love these people around here, and I miss them.”
Getting accustomed to life outside the courtroom has proven challenging at times for Collier.
“I do miss some of the legal drama,” he said. “I had a professor who said that if you had never been in a courtroom or a trial, just go watch because it’s better than being at a movie. And it is.”
One of Collier’s funniest memories in the courtroom came from a case that could have come from a Hollywood comedy. A man charged with indecent exposure for standing in a yard wearing nothing but a scarf over his face appeared before Collier in court representing himself.
“The police officer described him as looking like a ninja,” he said. “The defendant said, ‘How could you tell it was me? My face was covered.’ I look over at the jury and they’re laughing or trying their best not to. It was kind of comical.”
Now retired, Collier gets his laughs from his 3-year-old grandson, who calls him “Umpa.”
“He said the other day, ‘Umpa, I want a sister and a boy. I want both of them,’” he chuckled. “[My wife and I] told his parents, and they said they would like to have another child as soon as possible.”
After a career in which he put families together in adoption court and brought other families justice, now Collier gets to enjoy his own growing family.
Judge Collier’s advice to aspiring attorneys and judges
Ms. O’Brien, this is a great story. Our judicial system sure needs more judges like judge Collier. He seems like just an all around good guy. I liked your interview with him too.