Orange County Focus is dedicated on Monday to analysis of community news, a look atwhat’s ahead and the voices of local people. : IN PERSON : He Aims to Do Justice to His Famous Forebear : After a Life in Law, James R. Ross Takes Stand for Jesse James

FULLERTON —  When his grandfather told him the stories, young Jimmy Ross could forget about his wooden wheelchair and the polio that left his legs limp by his 10th birthday. Closing his eyes, the boy would share danger and dusty trails with Jesse James. He could not only walk, but he could ride.

The stories were far more than flights of fancy for Ross. They were family history. His grandfather was Jesse Edwards James, son of the notorious outlaw, and the tales were firsthand accounts.

As years passed, a healthy Ross walked away from his wheelchair for good, but he never forgot those vivid stories or his blood link to one of the most notorious villains of the Old West.

Jimmy grew up to become James R. Ross, a Fullerton resident and, until last month, a judge in Orange County Superior Court. His legal career may seem to clash with his ancestor’s line of work, but it has served the 69-year-old Ross well. Being the great-grandson of Jesse James, it turns out, means spending a lot of time in court.

For years, Ross’ family has battled others who claim they too are descendants of the folk hero, whose post-Civil War crime sprees in the North were romanticized as retribution by vanquished Southerners.

“We have had to listen to the most horrible things,” Ross said. “There have been three lawsuits, and we’ve won all of them. Now we hope we can settle everything once and for all.”

How? Last month a team of 15 scientists descended on tiny Kearney, Mo., and dug up the decayed remains of the gunslinger. The researchers began a battery of tests they hope will conclusively show by the end of the year whether James was indeed shot to death in 1882, at the age of 34, as Ross and his clan contend.

Nailing that fact down would dispel the claims of people who insist they were part of a second bloodline that began after the outlaw faked his death and hid out for decades under different aliases.

Ross bitterly dismissed those stories as hurtful myths. He recalled his grandfather’s reaction some 60 years ago, when a con man claiming to be the aged outlaw staged a well-publicized “return” and told reporters he would visit his son.

“You have to know that my grandfather, as a boy, ran in when Jesse was shot and saw his father there dead, bleeding from the shot to his head,” Ross said. “So when this faker said he wanted to see his son, they had to hold my grandfather back, even though his health was poor by then. He said, ‘He wants to see me? I’ll see him . . . where’s that gun? Go get Jesse’s old gun! I’ll see him!’ ”

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Ross sat back in his seat and chuckled, clearly pleased with the memory of his grandfather’s feisty defense of the family honor. Tenacious independence, he said proudly, is his birthright. “My grandfather always told me I better never back down from anybody,” he said. “And I don’t.”

Ross notes with pride that he was the judge who ruled in May, 1984, that Disneyland had violated the civil rights of two gay teens when security guards ejected them from the amusement park for dancing together during Date Night.

Asked to reflect on the case, Ross shrugged. “I reviewed the appropriate issues and evidence and I made the decision.” The recent retiree still sits like a judge, his fingers locked together in front of him and his brows raised inquisitively. Though he was wearing a T-shirt and shorts, it was not difficult imagining him back in the black robe.

“There was more stress in being a judge than I ever imagined,” Ross said. “You have to be 100% fair to all sides. It’s a tightrope. But it’s easier than being a trial lawyer. At least I didn’t have to walk the floor at nights like I did when I was a trial attorney.”

After 29 years of long hours and sweating verdicts as an attorney, Ross was appointed to the bench in 1983. It meant more time to spend with family, and he could finally devote his evenings to a long-overdue project.

It took Ross three years to write his book, “I, Jesse James,” but he said the finished product may be the most accurate account of the legendary figure’s exploits.

The book, which is written in the first-person voice of Jesse James, has sold about 8,000 copies. Writing it required not only sifting through records and family documents, but also somehow getting inside the head of the long-dead outlaw. Ross said the experience made his bond with his heritage even stronger.

“I don’t know what he actually said or thought, of course, but I feel I know so much about him that I can capture the way it might have been,” he said. Ross described his great-grandfather as a good-natured joker, a relatively unschooled but intelligent man who often quoted from the dogeared Bible he always toted.

James probably would have become a minster like his father if it weren’t for the Civil War, Ross said.

A teen-age James fought with a band of guerrillas who terrorized Union soldiers in Missouri and, when the war ended, continued that battle against the Northerners he saw as ruthless invaders, Ross said. The life of a bandit soon became the only life he knew.

James was no cold-blooded killer, despite the way films and novels portray him, Ross contends. When one train robbery resulted in the death of an engineer, James sent his share of the loot to the man’s widow. And when James shot a bank teller he mistakenly thought was an old Union nemesis, the death weighed on him for years, Ross said.

“He abhorred violence, and that death really stayed with him,” Ross said.

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It has clearly stuck with his great-grandson, too, a law-and-order man who grew up admiring a lawless bandit. The cold-blooded killing of an innocent is tough to excuse, even for someone who grew up with Jesse James’ pistol and boots in the cupboard.

So what would Ross do if he had to preside over a trial where the infamous Jesse James was the defendant? Ross sat back, again locking his fingers in front of him, and smiled.

“That’s a good question,” he said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Profile: James R. Ross

Age: 69

Residence: Fullerton

Heritage: Great-grandson of Jesse James who has written a book about his notorious ancestor. Ross and his clan had a team of 15 scientists exhume James last month to gather evidence proving the outlaw did not stage his death in 1882.

Career: Orange County Superior Court judge retired July 7 after 12 years on the bench. A UCLA alumnus, he was appointed by Gov. Jerry Brown in 1983 after 29 years as a trial attorney.

Family: Married to Rosemary for 45 years; children: Bonnie, 38; Randy, 34; David, 32, and Liza, 27

Looking back: “Jesse James was part of our family life when I was growing up. He was woven into who we were as a family. As a kid, I wanted to know all about him. Robin Hood, King Arthur and Jesse James. Those were my heroes.”

Source: James Ross; Researched by GEOFF BOUCHER / Los Angeles Times