The bar for attorneys in San Bernardino is now set at Michael Scafiddi.
The San Bernardino County Bar Association awarded the criminal defense lawyer the prestigious John B. Surr Award, making him the 24th recipient in 44 years.
The association presented the award at the 2021-22 Installation and Awards Banquet April 21, held in the former packing house the Mitten Building in downtown Redlands, which was packed with over 170 diners.
The event also saw the swearing in of the association’s new officers, including president John Short of Brown White & Osborn LLP.
Scafiddi thanked multiple supporters and members of his family before leaving everyone a charge to better themselves.
“Everybody in here has the opportunity to be a great man or woman. Everyone in here has the opportunity to change someone else’s life. So on behalf of my family, my friends, my colleagues, my mentors, (Florentino Garza), Eloise (Gómez Reyes) and everyone else who believes in true justice, leave big footprints in the sand,” Scafiddi said as he accepted the award.
The bar association awards it only when they believe someone is deserving, and not on an annual basis.
Attorney William Shapiro, who hired Scafiddi as an investigator in 1992, and attorney Eric Hunt, who attended law school with Scafiddi, presented the award.
“We celebrate, and we honor, one of our members who is so highly distinguished that he sets the bar with regard to professionalism, the administration of justice, and simply being a phenomenal lawyer, and beyond that, a phenomenal person,” Shapiro said. Shapiro received the John B. Surr award himself in 2013.
Although the award is presented intermittently, the dinner is held annually to install the bar association’s new officers.
This year, Judge Bryan Foster swore in the new officers and directors.
In his speech, President John Short quoted from the original constitution made by the San Bernardino Bar Association in 1875, which stated that one of the association’s goals was “to enable its members more fully to cultivate and practice those courtesies of the profession which, based upon the highest sense of honor, are extended to, and recognized among, the best lawyers of the civilized world.”
Short said he was proud the bar association still held that goal. He thanked the bar association’s executive director Claire Furness, his firm for allowing him to volunteer, and his family.
San Bernardino County Supervisor Janice Rutherford lauded Short’s volunteer work on a county project rehabilitating Lake Gregory Regional Park in Crestline, and said the bar association was lucky to have him as its new president.
“It was a combination of the integrity and focus to attention that John was able to bring, with his legal skills, more importantly his listening skills and his people skills, which is why I think you’ve selected him as your president, he was able to bring together a contentious community, a bunch of engineers who didn’t speak community, and help us communicate well with the state,” Rutherford said.
Past president Barbara Keough said she was glad the bar association survived the pandemic.
“Everybody here, and those who aren’t here, you guys came through. We are still strong. We have not suspended this organization despite COVID. We are still a family, and we still enjoy gathering together,” Keough said.
Jack Osborn of Redlands’ Brown White & Osborn LLP served as the master of ceremonies for the dinner.
“Our theme (tonight) really is service. As attorneys, one of the things we realize really quickly is that we have a responsibility. We have a responsibility to each other of course, but we also have a responsibility to give back to the community,” Osborn said.
Past president Michael Reiter presented a short history on the bar association’s history.
San Bernardino Superior Judge Wilfred Schneider gave a history of John Boyer Surr. The attorney was born in Manila, Philippines, in 1906. Surr’s father was in the country representing a hardware company, and he later became a lawyer. Surr studied at Berkeley, and graduated from University of California, Berkeley, in 1926. He joined the bar in 1928, and was given the number 10558. Surr then joined his uncle, Howard Surr, in his San Bernardino law office of Hellyer & Surr, known today as Reid & Hellyer.
Surr was skilled in water law, but also practiced corporate real estate law, bankruptcy law and insurance defense. He was involved in water rights litigation and handled pro bono cases. He was president of the bar association, was on the board of governors for the state bar, served on the Redlands City Council and sat on multiple community committees. He would hike up San Gorgonio Mountain to ski down, before the time of ski lifts, and founded the Edelweiss Club of skiers who built a ski hut at the 9,500-foot level. In the 1960s, he persuaded Congress to avoid commercial development of the bottom of the mountain.
Surr was then a fixture of the Cafe Madrid social circle of judges and lawyers who met in the cafe of Harris’ department store a block from the courthouse.
“Simply stated, ladies and gentlemen, John B. Surr became the standard by which all others were judged. He is our ground zero for civility, professionalism, ethics and excellence long before anyone had ever heard of the Inns of Court,” Schneider said.
Assemblymember Eloise Gómez Reyes congratulated Scafiddi during her speech.
“Mike absolutely deserves this. John B. Surr was a distinguished lawyer. That’s you. He was a respected citizen. That’s you. He was a devoted conservationist. That’s you. And admired by all that knew him. That’s you,” Gómez Reyes said.
Scafiddi thanked multiple members of his family, and said he developed a sense of justice from his mother.
“No matter how poor we were, and I mean we were poor – we ate stew, potato and eggs, and pasta, seven nights a week; (my mother) fed us on six to seven to eight dollars a night. But I will never forgot me watching her, she had a dollar left, someone asked for 50 cents, the neighbor next door, and she gave it to her. I learned a lesson that day. That no matter how bad it is, no matter how good it is, always reach out and help someone else. My mom taught me that. And that has driven me for my entire life. It has driven me to practice holistic lawyering. In our office, we phrase it as compassionate lawyering. It means not just helping a client on their case. But helping every part of them. Being there for them,” Scafiddi said.
Scafiddi was raised on the East Coast, and was an Ontario police officer before he became an attorney. He was president of the San Bernardino County Bar Association in 2008, and currently is president of the Western San Bernardino County Bar Association.
He also represents people pro bono through the Legal Aid Society, of which he has been on the board of directors since 1997. He was the society’s vice president from 2004 to 2017, and their president from 2017 to 2021, Hunt said.
Scafiddi provides two full scholarships every year, for the past 10 years, to underprivileged students at Aquinas Catholic High School in San Bernardino, and funded both the school’s outdoor amphitheater and athletic hall of fame wall, Hunt said.
“Mike is unshaken in his belief that everyone deserves the best possible representation. Mike has shown again and again how he exemplifies the high standards of the profession and the administration of justice as put forth in the John B. Surr award,” Hunt said.
