Pier Gherini Sr.; Judge’s Family Owned Island
Pier Gherini Sr., an attorney and judge whose family owned and once ranched Santa Cruz Island off the Santa Barbara coast, has died in Santa Barbara, it was learned this week.
A son, Thomas, said his father died June 29 of the complications of a stroke at age 76.
Gherini was a great-grandson of Justinian Caire, who bought an interest in Santa Cruz Island in 1869 and became its sole owner in 1880. The family raised prize-winning sheep on the island.
In 1980, Congress authorized the purchase of the Gherinis’ remaining 6,380 acres as part of the Channel Islands National Park, but the purchase remains inconclusive.
Gherini was an attorney and Police Court judge in Santa Barbara after World War II. He was a graduate of the Boalt School of Law at UC Berkeley and practiced in Santa Barbara until he served in the Army Air Corps Counter-Intelligence Service during the war.
In 1967, then-Gov. Ronald Reagan named him to head the California Fair Employment Practices Commission. He served until 1975.
He is survived by two other sons, a daughter, a brother, two sisters and four grandchildren.
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