Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 24, 1990 TAG: 9005240259
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-4 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: By PAUL DELLINGER SOUTHWEST BUREAU
DATELINE: ABINGDON LENGTH: Medium
For Cynthia D. Kinser, it was a return trip. The Lee County native started her law career here in 1977 as a law clerk for U.S. Judge Glen M. Williams.
After her year as a clerk, Kinser returned to Jonesville to open a law office. She was Lee County commonwealth's attorney from 1980 to 1984. She is a graduate of the University of Virginia law school.
Among the more than 100 people packed into the federal courtroom were her husband, Allen; their two children; and her parents. In her remarks after receiving the oath from Chief District Judge James C. Turk, she said she had asked her husband what she should say and he advised her to "say `thank you' and sit down."
She said a little more than that, but most of the talk came from various other judges and court officials welcoming her.
Williams called on Roy V. Wolfe Jr., who is retiring as a magistrate and being replaced by Kinser, to make some remarks and "see if you can wake this crowd up."
"Somewhere back in antiquity, I think it is recorded that Marc Antony said to Cleopatra: I did not come here to speak," Wolfe said. He merely welcomed his successor.
"Cynthia is a favorite of ours in Lee County. She has served with distinction as a commonwealth's attorney," said retired Circuit Judge William C. Fugate. U.S. Western District Attorney John Perry Alderman said she could have been a federal prosecutor as well.
"I offered her a job in 1984. I really wanted her in the United States attorney's office," Alderman said. "The only problem, you know, was that I couldn't open an office in Jonesville."
Mary Lynn Tate, an Abingdon lawyer who is president-elect of the Virginia Trial Lawyers Association, recalled an early case she argued which drew a crowd because, as Lee County lawyer Ronnie Montgomery explained to her, "you are an anomaly."
That kind of reaction to women lawyers was what Kinser faced when she opened a law office in Jonesville, became a trial lawyer and prosecutor, Tate said. "Thankfully we are no longer an anomaly."
"It'll be somewhat of a relief to go into court and not have to face Cynthia. She's a dandy," said Jonesville lawyer Edgar Bacon.
"For a while there, I felt like she couldn't be beat. I'd go into court and she'd just whup me," said Greg Edwards, president of the Lee County Bar Association. "We almost didn't have a reception today. She didn't want one. She said, `Just forget about it; I want to go to work.' But we're going to have one, anyway."
by CNB