David Admire is sitting in his near-empty office and reflecting on a 22-year career, filled with tens of thousands of people coming to him with their problems.

Whether they had skipped a stop sign or assaulted a spouse, King County District Court Judge Admire says he tried to help mend their lives.

Like the young man the judge sent to jail for drunken driving about 12 years ago. Admire kept the man in jail for more than two years, until he started to turn his life around. Just months after he was released, the man sent a Christmas card thanking the judge for "saving my life."

The cards came every year for a decade, signed by the man and his new wife, then their daughters. The last card included a photo of the man's daughter in her soccer uniform, with her father as coach, and the man wrote: "Did you think I'd ever be at this point?"

Admire retired yesterday at the age of 56, after spending more than two decades in the same courtroom and office in downtown Redmond. His philosophy, he said, was simple: "What do I have to do to make sure they don't need to do anything [illegal] again?"

Admire had a host of tools to use as motivation — jail, alcohol treatment, community service, work crew — but he is best known for creating some of his own tools.

In the early 1980s, when he was campaigning for his first term as a judge, he had a conversation with a woman whose son had been killed by a drunken driver. Within two years, Admire and Shirley Anderson created drunken-driving victim panels, where DUI offenders are sentenced to an evening of listening to stories from victims.

The panels are now used in all 50 states. Admire says he was inspired by DUI offenders he saw in his courtroom who weren't heeding his warnings. He told Anderson, "I think they'll hear the victims more than they'll hear me."

In 1989, he started a program to teach anger management and problem-solving skills to criminals with attention-deficit disorder (ADD) and learning disabilities. The program is credited with reducing its participants' repeat offenses by 40 percent, Admire said.

Most prison inmates have ADD or a learning disability, the judge said, but he was convinced of the impact of the disabilities by raising his two sons, who both have ADD. He recalls his sons following only part of an instruction, or becoming frustrated by their disability.

"If you didn't have a personal connection to it, you wouldn't think certain things can happen [with ADD]," Admire said.

At a farewell party in his courtroom this week, defense attorneys, prosecutors, judges and court staffers talked about his compassion and his "long view" of improving defendants' lives.

"He has the ability to blend fairness with courtesy and a great deal of common sense," said Redmond District Court Judge David Steiner.

Indeed, for many Eastside residents who never come close to committing a major crime, Admire was their only exposure to the legal system. District Court judges handle traffic tickets, small civil claims and many criminal cases such as domestic violence, drunken driving and trespassing.

"The court system will only work when people feel they have faith in it," Admire said. "It will only work when they feel they've had a fair hearing. ... They can go out saying our system works."

Ashley Bach: 206-464-2567