Joseph Wapner, Judge On TV’s ‘The People’s Court,’ Dies At 97

Former judge on The People’s Court, Joseph Wapner, died Sunday in his home in Los Angeles. Wapner’s son, David, confirmed his death.

Not just a television judge, Wapner received his law degree from the University of Southern California in 1948. After practicing law for nearly a decade, in 1959, Governor Edmund Brown of California appointed him to a Los Angeles municipal court judgeship.

After advancing further to become a presiding judge of Los Angeles’ Superior Court system, which is the largest in the country, Wapner retired and auditioned for The People’s Court  in 1981. He acted as the presiding judge on the television show until 1993.

Ed Koch, the former mayor of New York City, became the new judge on The People’s Court after Wapner retired.

Many view The People’s Court as one of the first shows to make waves in the reality TV genre. In 1989, The Washington Post conducted a poll and found that 54 percent of those surveyed could identify Wapner as the judge on The People’s Court, while significantly less could name a single justice on the United States Supreme Court.