James R. Caiola, 97, a retired Norristown lawyer and advocate for police officers, died Thursday at his home.
Mr. Caiola grew up in Norristown, where he worked as a shoeshine boy in the borough hall. When he was 10, he later told a reporter, he recognized a man pushing a broom in the hall as the former police officer who used to walk the beat in his neighborhood. "He was too old to be a policeman," Mr. Caiola said, "and because he had no pension he was working as a janitor."
Mr. Caiola told the story to explain why, in 1944, he helped found Norristown's police union and, in 1947, he helped establish its pension fund - one of the first for police in the state. He served as the union's solicitor for nearly three decades and was also solicitor for the Police Chiefs of Montgomery County from 1945 to 1990.
Mr. Caiola graduated from Norristown High School. He earned a bachelor's degree from American University and a law degree from Georgetown University.
For more than 55 years, he maintained a practice in Norristown. His son, Frank, also a lawyer, said his father retired just before his 90th birthday.
Mr. Caiola gave lectures on police procedures at seminars in London, Paris, Rome, West Germany and Puerto Rico and conducted a course for FBI agents on courtroom procedure and presentation of evidence. He prepared law school graduates for the Pennsylvania bar examination as an instructor at the Kratz Bar Review Course in Philadelphia.
In the 1960s, his son said, his father's use of the temporary-insanity defense in murder trials attracted the attention of well-known criminal lawyer Melvin Belli, who invited Mr. Caiola to California for consultation.
Mr. Caiola was founder and past president of the Norristown Republican Club; was past president of Camp Rainbow, a nonprofit organization for underprivileged children; and served on the board of the Norristown Child Development Center. He also established the Legal Assistance Project for low-income senior citizens in Norristown.
In addition to his son, he is survived by his wife of 68 years, Lenore Lucas Caiola; a daughter, Julia Tempest; two sisters; four grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
A Funeral Mass will be said at 11 a.m. today at Holy Saviour Church, 407 E. Main St., Norristown. Friends may call at 9 a.m. Burial will be in St. Patrick's Cemetery, East Norriton.
Contact staff writer Sally A. Downey at 215-854-2913 or sdowney@phillynews.com.
