Thursday, February 3, 2005
Page 3
Services Tomorrow for Retired Commissioner Pugsley
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Services are scheduled tomorrow for retired Long Beach Municipal Court Commissioner George L. Pugsley, who died Saturday at age 76.
Pugsley was a commissioner from 1977 to 1997, and had previously been a deputy district attorney—assigned to the sexual assault unit—and a deputy public defender.
The Rhode Island native taught school in California and Connecticut before embarking on a legal career.
A sometimes actor and athlete—he attended Ventura Junior College on an athletic scholarship in the early 1950s—he drew on the latter background when he sentenced two brothers to maximum jail terms in 1986 after they attacked an umpire at a Long Beach slow-pitch softball game.
“I played a lot of baseball in my day,” a newspaper article quoted Pugsley as saying before announcing the sentences. “I played with bad guys and bellyachers. But nobody ever picked up a bat and the ump was never assaulted. This case violates the rules of sportsmanship.”
Pugsley gave Greg Sinsun a one-year jail sentence for misdemeanor assault with a deadly weapon, and Benito Sinsun a six-month term for simple assault.
Tomorrow’s funeral mass will be said at 11 a.m. at Holy Trinity Catholic Church, 1292 West Santa Cruz St. San Pedro. Letters of condolence may be sent to McKenzie Mortuary, 2870 Orange Avenue, Signal Hill, CA 90755.
The commissionerís family requested that memorial donations be sent to the American Alzheimers Association.
Copyright 2005, Metropolitan News Company