Aubrey E. Robinson Jr.; District of Columbia Judge

Aubrey E. Robinson Jr., 77, a former chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia who, in one of his more notable rulings, sentenced Jonathan Jay Pollard to life in prison when he was convicted of spying for Israel. A stickler for courtroom decorum, Robinson had a reputation for fairness, independence and a no-nonsense approach to the law. “There are no games to be played,” he told the Washington Post when he became chief judge in 1982. “. . . This is . . . a place where people expect to get their legal problems resolved . . . and we’re the ones to do it.” Robinson, a Madison, N.J., native and a World War II Army veteran, received undergraduate and law degrees at Cornell University. He was appointed to the bench of the old District of Columbia Juvenile Court in 1965 and elevated to the U.S. District Court the following year. Robinson became chief judge in 1982, the second African American to hold that position. On Sunday of a heart attack in Washington, D.C.