SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) — As he prepares to take the bench in a couple weeks, Robert Tiefenthaler thinks back on experiences years ago that will shape the kind of judge he hopes to be.
The only person of color in his hometown and school and a self-described fat kid, he was a constant target of bullies. He answered to nicknames he didn’t realize were racist until he was older and understood what people, some of them family members, were calling him.
It led to bouts with depression in high school and therapy sessions. He eventually decided that no one could stop people from picking on him, so he’d make it impossible for them to do so.
“Since my junior year in high school, I strived to be my best in whatever I did,” Tiefenthaler told the Sioux City Journal. “My goal was to be the best, because when you’re number one, no one can make fun of you.”
On Sept. 1, Tiefenthaler, 53, of Sergeant Bluff, will become the first Black district court judge in Iowa’s Third Judicial District.
“I’m proud to be the first. I hope I’m not the last,” he said.
Tiefenthaler also hopes his background, not just as a person of color but also as a hate crime victim and someone with up-close experience with addiction and mental illness, will help those who stand before him believe they received a fair hearing.
“I think I’m a person who has crossed cultural lines and has had experiences that will shape the way I see cases,” Tiefenthaler said. “I hope everybody who leaves my courtroom feels they’ve been treated fairly.”
He’s drawn upon those experiences to identify with clients during his years as a private attorney who practiced family, personal injury, juvenile and worker’s compensation law and criminal defense law.
Those experiences began 10 days after he was born in Sioux City and adopted by Bonnie and Dean Tiefenthaler, a white couple from Breda in Carroll County, where he worked on the family farm and hauled gravel during the summers he was in college for his dad’s trucking company. He was a gifted singer, and at Kuemper Catholic High School in Carroll, he learned he also had a knack for talking and arguing, honing all those skills in school musicals, speech and debate.
Still, he was the only Black student in school, and his lighter skin tone made it hard for him to identify himself, even while others called him names.
It helped fuel that competitive desire to be the best, and he attended the University of South Dakota, majoring in criminal justice and political science as an undergraduate before earning his law degree there in 1994. During college, he met other Black students and learned more about a culture he still wasn’t sure applied to him because of uncertainty about his background.
That uncertainty eased after making contact with his biological parents, Louise Jenn and James Fenceroy, while he was in college. The relationship he developed with his biological parents, both of whom live in Sioux City, and their families helped him answer questions about his own identity. They joined his adoptive family at his law school graduation and will do so again during his Sept. 23 swearing-in ceremony, along with his wife, Brenda, with whom he has two children and six grandchildren.
Tiefenthaler credits his paralegal, Barbara Renfro, who’s been with him since he opened his own practice in 1999, for helping him develop compassion for the underdog. The numerous court-appointed clients he’s had over the years taught him how much drug addiction and mental illness can be responsible for criminal behavior, showing that crimes aren’t always what they appear to be on the surface. He sometimes was frustrated with how the judicial system didn’t always take the extra step to order services that could have treated issues that led to his clients’ criminal behaviors.
“Justice doesn’t come in one nice package in each case,” Tiefenthaler said. “I now have the power to do something about it.”
He laughs that acquaintances tell him he’s crazy to give up income as a private attorney and take on the added responsibilities of a judge. Tiefenthaler said they’re missing the point.
“I have felt a higher calling to do this. If I’m in it for the money, I’m in it for the wrong reasons,” he said. “I’ve just wanted to make a difference in people’s lives.”
Now, he’ll have more chances to do so. He can order offenders to undergo addiction treatment or therapy that could improve their lives.
His experience as the victim of two separate hate crime assaults, he said, also helps him understand how victims are affected by the offenders who will appear before him.
“My judicial philosophy is I think everyone should have their day in court,” Tiefenthaler said. “The courtroom is supposed to be a place where everyone feels they’ve been treated equally.”
Coming from someone who knows how it feels to be treated badly just because of his appearance, it’s a statement that speaks loudly and comes from experience.
The experience that will help guide his decisions and benefit those who come into his courtroom.
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