In Memoriam Judge Frank Caprio

By Justice Markandey Katju, former Judge, Supreme Court of India, and Savaira Shafaq, Advocate, Peshawar High Court, Pakistan

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Judge Frank Caprio, a municipal court judge in the city of Providence in the state of Rhode Island, USA, recently passed away at the age of 88. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Caprio

Both of us, one a 79 year old former Judge of the Indian Supreme Court living in Delhi ( justicekatju@gmail.com ), and the other a young lady lawyer practising in the Peshawar High Court, Pakistan ( savaira7878@gmail.com ), were his avid fans, having watched his performances in Court on youtube in the serial ‘Caught in Providence’ for many years. Similarly, millions of other people all over the globe had seen him functioning in court on youtube, and had become his ardent fans.

His judicial work was televised on the program Caught in Providence adjudicating cases of traffic violations. The Caught in Providence YouTube channel had 2.92 million subscribers. In 2017, his videos in the courtroom went viral, with more than 15 million views. By 2022, views of Caught in Providence neared 500 million. He became well known for his empathy for those in distress and humour in court.

A municipal court judge is at the lowest level of the judicial hierarchy ( equivalent to a mere judicial magistrate in India and Pakistan ). Yet, Judge Frank Caprio had become a legend in his lifetime, known not only in America but all over the world, something which even judges at the apex of the judicial hierarchy could never achieve.

 How did this happen ?

To understand this one must understand that justice is not simply following the letter of the law. Real justice is administering the law to human situations, and this Judge Caprio understood perhaps better than all other judges of the world. 

One of us ( Justice Katju ) in his judgment in Vishnu Agarwal vs State of UP, 2011, quoted a shloka of the Indian jurist Brihaspati ( mentioned in the work Smriti Chandrika ) :

” केवलं शास्त्रमाश्रित्य न कर्तव्यो विनिर्णयः ।

युक्तिहीनविचारे तु धर्महानिः प्रजायते ॥

kevalaṁ śhaastram aashritya na kartavyo vinirṇayaḥ |
yukti-heene vichaare tu dharma-haani prajaayate ||

i.e.

“ Ajudgment should not be given by merely following the letter of the law

  For if the decision is wholly unreasonable, injustice will follow ”

Judge Caprio would never have heard of this shloka of Brihaspati. Yet he instinctively followed it in Court. In  every case he heard, he not only considered the law, but also the situation of the person arraigned before him, how many children does he/she have, what was his/her financial and health condition, what was her excuse for breaching the law, etc ? In other words, equity considerations and compassion, not just the letter of the law, also weighed on his mind before passing his order.

The Judge created a fund called the Filomena Fund ( named after his mother ) for paying the fines of people who could not pay, and thousands of people contributed to this Fund

Judge Caprio was a municipal judge in Providence from 1985 to 2023. On his very first day as a judge his father Antonio attended his court. In one of the cases that day, Judge Caprio imposed a fine of 300 dollars on a poor woman with 3 small kids, who said she had no means of paying.

In the evening Judge Caprio asked his father how was his performance in Court. His father gave him an admonition, saying ” You can’t treat people like that. The poor woman had 3 kids ”. Judge Caprio never forgot this admonition all his life, as he recounted in this interview :

https://www.facebook.com/therealfrankcaprio/videos/dont-judge-me-first-day-failure/287031284301304

May his soul rest in peace