Revered and renowned, Oakland judge had a gift for good humor
By Tom Kirvan
Legal News
In the spring of 2007 after more than 30 years on the bench, then Oakland County Circuit Judge Gene Schnelz earned a royal retirement salute from hundreds of well-wishers during a reception at Shenandoah Country Club in West Bloomfield.
It was billed as “a series of short talks eulogizing the Judge for his sweetness, kindness, patience, wonderful temperament, and stressing what a great mediator/arbitrator he will be.”
It was not his funeral. He preferred that wait awhile. When that inevitable day did arrive, however, Judge Schnelz knew that his many friends and admirers would be poised for action.
“Harold Bulgarelli, a longtime friend and a retired district court judge, once told me that he was working on my eulogy and it was up to 40 pages,” Judge Schnelz recalled at the time. “Years later when I asked him how it was coming, he said it was now down to a moment of silence.”
Such humor, whether he was on the giving or the receiving end, was a Schnelz trademark, which sadly came to an end in the early morning hours of December 5 when the beloved jurist died under hospice care at his home following a short illness. He was 87.
“His health had declined, but I expected that he would be around for at least a couple of more years,” said his son, Birmingham attorney Kurt Schnelz, a past president of the Oakland County Bar Association. “We’re all in a state of shock about how fast it happened. He was such a force in our family and in the legal community. It’s a huge loss.”
Ironically, due to the restrictions on large gatherings in the midst of the pandemic, the funeral service for Judge Schnelz took place on Monday, Dec. 7 at St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Walled Lake with just a few family members present.
“It wasn’t what any of us wanted in terms of a celebration of his life, but under the circumstances it was all that we could do,” Schnelz said of the memorial service.
Regardless, admirers will remember Judge Schnelz as a “legal legend,” which was symbolized by the impact he made on those that he mentored and the host of awards that he won, including in 1994 the Roberts P. Hudson Award, the most coveted honor that the State Bar of Michigan presents each year.
“Gene really was the gold standard as a lawyer and as a judge,” said Tom Ryan, a past president of the State Bar. “His passing signals the end of an era, as his legal career in many respects mirrored the growth and prosperity of Oakland County. He really was a larger-than-life figure who served as a mentor to me and many other young lawyers who practiced in Oakland County.”
Of course, Schnelz’s legal influence extended statewide as well, according to Ryan.
“He, I believe, set the record as the longest serving member of the State Bar Board of Commissioners at 20 years, so long in fact that he may have been the reason there are now term limits,” Ryan said with a wink. “In all seriousness, Gene really enjoyed his work on behalf of the State Bar and he was especially proud when he had the opportunity to be on the board with Kurt. That was really a special time for him.”
Betty Lowenthal, a longtime Friend of the Court referee in Oakland County before retiring, was a freshman law student when she first met Schnelz in 1978, shortly after he joined the Circuit Court bench.
“I was a school teacher at the time, attending law school at nights,” said Lowenthal, the daughter of immigrant survivors of the Holocaust. “There was a sign on one of the bulletin boards for a clerkship opening and I applied for it.”
The job interview with the new Circuit Court judge was the “funniest ever,” said Lowenthal.
“After the usual pleasantries, I think the first question he asked was whether I was a Republican or a Democrat,” Lowenthal said with a laugh. “When I told him that he couldn’t ask me that, he agreed but said that he still wanted to know.”
Later, he asked her if she knew any attorneys in Oakland County who could vouch for her character. The two that she mentioned elicited a less than positive response from the judge.
“That man’s a drunk,” he bellowed about the one, followed in tongue-in-cheek fashion by “that man’s an idiot” of the second well-known lawyer.
By that time during the interview, Lowenthal was beginning to get a feel for what life could be like as the judge’s new clerk.
“Let’s just say that I knew it would be ‘interesting,’” said Lowenthal. “He told me at the end of the interview that the real reason he was hiring me was because my first name was Betty, the same as his wife’s, and that way he would never forget it.”
Such logic would soon make sense, as Lowenthal quickly gained an admiration for Schnelz’s smarts and legal skillset.
“I was amazed at how fast that he could think and how quickly he grasped the facts and the issues in the cases he handled,” Lowenthal said. “He really had a brilliant legal mind.”
And a mind for scripture, as a devout Lutheran – Missouri Synod denomination, she would add.
“I’ll always remember one case involving a Jehovah’s Witness who started quoting scripture,” Lowenthal recalled. “Gene, in turn, quoted it right back, chapter and verse. He wasn’t going to be outdone. He read his Bible every day.”
The judge, she said, even planned his own funeral.
“He wanted his former law clerks to be the pallbearers,” Lowenthal related. “The reason, he explained, was that he had carried them around his whole life and it was time for them to carry him.”
Don McGinnis, a prominent family law attorney in Oakland County for many years, carried a special admiration for Schnelz.
“He was smart as a whip,” McGinnis said. “He would get to the heart of the matter really quickly, and seemed to be always a couple steps ahead of everyone else involved in a case. He really was as smart as they come, but also as good-natured a man as you’ll ever meet. I know that I will miss him greatly.”
Schnelz was a 1958 graduate of the former Detroit College of Law, now known as Michigan State University College of Law. He started his own law practice in Walled Lake, partnering with Harold Bulgarelli, representing a number of local municipalities and the Walled Lake Consolidated School District. Throughout his time in private practice, he was active with the Oakland County Bar Association, eventually serving as president from 1972-73. He later was honored by the OCBA with the Frances R. Avadenka Award (1993) and the Distinguished Public Servant Award (2007).
In 1974, he was elected to the 52-1 District Court, which served as a stepping stone to the Oakland Circuit Court four years later. He retired from the Circuit Court in 2007, but continued to practice law, acting Of Counsel to Schnelz Wells, P.C., the Birmingham firm that his son co-founded.
As a past president of the OCBA, Judge Schnelz shared that distinction with his son and another of his mentees, Mike Schloff, a longtime fixture in the Oakland County legal community.
“Gene was a dear friend and a terrific role model for generations of lawyers,” said Schloff, who was a newly-minted assistant prosecutor in Oakland County when he first crossed paths with Schnelz.
“I got to know him well when I was assigned to a kidnapping and armed robbery case that was before him in 52-1 District Court of Walled Lake,” Schloff said. “The case took a number of days and during that time he really got to know me and I got to know him, as we developed a bit of a professional bond.”
Later, Schloff felt comfortable enough that he confided to the judge that he and his wife, Mary, were planning to adopt a child and were in the midst of the lengthy adoption process.
“He was kind enough to ask if there was anything he could to help out, and when I told him that we needed three references, he quickly agreed to be one of them,” Schloff said. “We were thrilled, since his reputation and position carried a lot of weight.”
Within a few days, Schloff received an envelope in the mail with a carbon copy of a letter that Judge Schnelz had purportedly sent to the adoption agency.
“The first paragraph was great, saying something to the effect that we were wonderful, law-abiding people of the highest character,” Schloff said. “Then there was the second paragraph, which started off with the word ‘However,’ which is never a word you want to see in a character reference.”
Especially when it was followed by mention of a pending felony charge that was “in the process” of being cleared up.
“I was absolutely livid when I read that letter and immediately called his office to give him a piece of my mind,” Schloff said. “When Betty Lowenthal answered the phone and started chuckling, I knew that I had been had. It was my first real taste of his love for practical jokes.”
Schnelz was skilled at getting the last laugh, even occasionally on the equally adept Harold Bulgarelli, his law partner for 15 years.
At the retirement roast of Schnelz in 2007, Bulgarelli took particular joy in lampooning the honoree.
“Nobody ever got hoarse talking to Gene,” said Bulgarelli during his turn at the microphone, poking fun at the “loquacious nature” of his dear friend.
“Gene once told me that he loves food more than sex,” Bulgarelli continued. “I didn’t believe him until I went over to his house and saw mirrors over the dining room table.”
That table, all kidding aside, also served as a gathering point for the Schnelz family, a tight-knit group that was out in force for the 2007 retirement party. Son Kurt served as emcee. Daughters Elizabeth (a drama teacher) and Rebecca (an attorney) lauded their father for his kind and gentle ways, thanking him for “teaching us how to be helpers, how to be charitable.” His grandchildren – Stephanie (an attorney), Steven, Carrie, and Jacob – also took their turns at the podium, alternatively giving their grandfather some grief and some grace for his personality traits.
His wife, Betty, was there at this side, offering plenty of moral support. She has been his gem, his “forever Valentine” since they first set eyes upon each other some 65 years ago.
Their courtship, although it spanned a year, really amounted to a mere six hours, according to Judge Schnelz, who had an established set of criteria in mind for his future wife.
“After a series of disappointments, I came to the conclusion that my true love had to be a brunette, around 5 feet, 2 inches tall,” he said during an interview with The Legal News in 2013. “She also had to be German, a Lutheran, and not just any Lutheran, but one from the Missouri Synod denomination. She also had to be a professional, but someone from a middle-class family who knew the importance of sacrifice and hard work.”
A friend told Schnelz that she had found just such a woman for him. She was a nurse at Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, the city where she grew up. Their first date was to start at midnight one evening after her eight-hour shift ended at Beaumont. For Schnelz, it was the proverbial “love at first sight.”
“We talked for six hours that evening, me trying to convince her we were destined for each other and that she should marry me,” Schnelz said in all seriousness. “It was the best argument I ever made. That night we both knew we were meant for each other. I’m here to say that dreams do come true and that there can be storybook endings.”
He related his “love at first sight” story on the eve of Valentine’s Day, circa 2013. He even paused for a moment to show a special treat that his wife had given him that morning.
It was a Valentine card, perhaps the mother of all Valentine cards. It was big and brassy, the kind that can put a substantial dent in a pocketbook. It also spelled true love, something the two have shared since their first date decades ago.
He may have said it best at his retirement party, calling her “my best friend, my confidante, my advisor, my helpmate, my lover, my prayer partner, my gourmet chef, my sweetheart.”
Or perhaps he did himself one better in court one day.
“In the middle of a jury trial, there was a sudden tremor and the courthouse actually shook,” Judge Schnelz recalled. “Everyone was frightened for the moment and one of the attorneys blurted out that he had never had a room shake like that. Noting the anxiety in the jury, I commented that, ‘Well it happens to me every time I kiss my wife.’ Everyone laughed and the moment passed. The thing that pleased me most was that I ordered a transcript of the event and gave it to Betty as a Valentine. It saved me money.”
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