Rudolph Gerber, PhD, JD

Adjunct Lecturer

Judge Rudolph Gerber is now an Adjunct Faculty member in the Department of Sociology at the University of San Diego. He has moved to California in semi-retirement to continue his legal work and writing, as well as to be closer to his children and grandchildren who live here. He is also a member of the California bar and the American Arbitration Association in California. From 1972 to 1976 Gerber was associate director of the Arizona Criminal Code Commission. He was a private practitioner in both civil and criminal litigation prior to appointment to the superior court by then Governor Bruce Babbitt in 1979. He served nine years as a judge of the Maricopa County Superior Court, where he was Associate Presiding Judge (1985–1988). Gerber was appointed to Division One of the Court of Appeals by Governor Rose Mofford in 1988. He is one of the few people who has written death penalty legislation and who has prosecuted, defended and judged in capital cases.

Education

Gerber received a B.A. (1962) and M.A. (1963) in philosophy, St. Louis University; an M.A. (1964) in comparative literature, Columbia University (Woodrow Wilson Scholar); a Ph.D. (1966) in philosophy, Universite de Louvain, Belgium (Fulbright Scholar); a J.D. (1971) at University of Notre Dame; and an LL.M. (1986) in the judicial process, University of Virginia.

Scholarly and Creative Work

Judge Gerber has authored several books and articles on the legal system, and was Executive Editor of the Notre Dame Lawyer (1970–1971). He chaired the Arizona Criminal Jury Instructions Committee, and served on the Professionalism Committee of the State Bar and the City of Phoenix Judicial Selection Advisory Committee. He was a member of the Board of Visitors at the Arizona State University College of Law.

Teaching Interests

Judge Gerber was an assistant professor of philosophy at Notre Dame University and St. Louis University (1967–1971). He has also taught law-related courses at Arizona State University, Phoenix College, and Western International University. During Spring Semester 2010 at USD, he is teaching “The Death Penalty,” a 3-credit course which looks objectively at the American death penalty from colonial times to the present, offering legislative (statutes), judicial (cases and procedure), and social science data (empirical studies) approaches to various aspects of several legal issues.