Speed skaters need supreme balance, principled discipline and a precise application of power to glide across the ice in record time. The same can be said of district court judges who oversee civil and criminal cases that carry life-long impacts for those involved.

Chief District Court Judge Gregory Lyman said his years as a professional speed skater, including competing in the 1972 Winter Olympics, taught him to dream big, and with hard work, lofty goals are achievable.

“If you have a purpose and a direction and a willingness to work, things will work out for you,” he said.

Lyman, 66, retired last week as district judge for the 6th Judicial District, which includes Archuleta, San Juan and La Plata counties. He was appointed to the judgeship in 1996 after interviewing with former Gov. Roy Romer in Denver.

“Driving across the state on the way home, all I could think of was how stupid I sounded,” Lyman told the Herald in 1996 shortly after learning he won the job. “I was beating myself up the whole way.”

Friends and colleagues described Lyman as among the most genuine, down-to-earth and fair-minded people they know.

Each morning he would pour himself a cup of coffee and make the rounds through the La Plata County Courthouse, poking his head in offices to say hello and chat with judicial clerks, probation officers and fellow judges, said Eric Hogue, administrator for the 6th and 22nd judicial districts.

“He’s just a good person,” Hogue said.

During his 20 years on the bench, Lyman helped oversee an ideological shift from a tough-on-crime attitude to one more closely focused on rehabilitation – an approach to criminal justice being embraced across the country to reduce recidivism and lower the prison population.

“I’m privileged to work in a system that values the recovery of human potential, and, actually, sometimes achieves it,” he said.

He has overseen numerous notable criminal cases, including a 2013 cold case trial in Pagosa Springs, in which a suspect was identified 24 years after a murder thanks to advances in DNA testing. Charles “Ray” Stane was found guilty in October 2013 of second-degree murder for the 1988 slaying of Vickie Calline Dexter, 40, of Durango. Lyman sentenced him to 48 years in prison, saying, “This has been a long time coming.”

“For a lot of reasons, it was a really interesting experience,” Lyman said of the trial. “With some really determined police work, they were able to put it together – get a conviction.”

Lyman also served as water judge for Division 7, which includes five counties in Southwest Colorado and drainage basins from a few other surrounding counties. During his tenure, he oversaw dozens of cases involving the Animas-La Plata water project, which stores 120,000 acre feet of water in Ridges Basin south of Durango. The project, which includes Lake Nighthorse, was authorized by Congress in 1968 to fulfill a water rights settlement of the Southern Ute, Ute Mountain Ute and Navajo Nation tribes. The lake faced numerous legal challenges and political hurdles before being built between 2002 to 2013.

As water judge, Lyman also wrote a precedent-setting opinion that requires oil and gas companies to obtain water permits before drilling when their activities impact underground waterways. The ruling was upheld in full by the Colorado Supreme Court.

Lyman was born and raised in Northbrook, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, that was home to a powerhouse speed-skating club that placed five competitors on the 1972 Olympic team, including Lyman, who was 21 at the time. He placed 20th out of 42 starters in the 500-meter held in Sapporo, Japan. He wears his Olympic ring everyday.

He got another ring that year when he married Patty, who won a world championship in short-track skating in 1978. They moved to Norway and competed in professional speed-skating events on the weekends. “It was a great way to start a marriage,” Lyman said. “I appreciate my wife and her willingness to share her life with me and go on this adventure.”

They have three children, Cody, Elly, and Noah – all married and living in the Denver area, where Lyman plans to spend more time with his grandchildren.

After two winters in Europe, Lyman and his wife moved back to the States. He attended the University of Wisconsin and graduated from the University of Illinois. He didn’t know what he wanted to do professionally, so he went to law school at University of Colorado Boulder.

“Our grand plan was to apply to law school, get a law degree and go find a beautiful town in the mountains to raise our family in, and we were lucky enough to do that,” he said.

Fresh out of law school, he served as a clerk for a district judge in Brighton, in Adams County.

“I realized how important a district judge is in so many people’s lives and how important it is that the person with that responsibility take that responsibility seriously and sensibly,” he told the Herald in 1996.

Lyman was a deputy district attorney in Gunnison before taking a job as a prosecutor in Durango. He was in private practice from 1985-87 in Wheatland, Wyoming, but returned in 1988 to work with Shand, McLachlan & Spear in Durango.

He was elected district attorney in November 1992, beating the Democratic and the Republican candidates to become the first unaffiliated candidate in memory to win a district attorney’s seat in Colorado.

Lyman, who remains unaffiliated, regularly received the highest scores for impartiality among judges statewide, said Durango lawyer Michael McLachlan, who spent 12 years on the judicial performance commission in Durango.

Lawyers aren’t typically good listeners, he said, because they listen only to things that are favorable to their clients and attack or dismiss anything contradictory. But Lyman transcended that instinct and proved to be a good listener upon taking the bench, he said.

“He doesn’t prejudge,” McLachlan said.

As chief judge, Lyman set the tone and morale for the 6th Judicial District, including for clerks, the probation department and other judges.

“He’s just one of the best, just rises way to the top, and he’s going to be severely missed,” McLachlan said.

District Judge Jeffrey Wilson, the new chief judge, said Lyman is gifted with the virtue of patience.

“What you see on the bench is Greg, that’s the real Greg – totally even-tempered, just a nice guy, very intelligent, rarely, rarely angry,” Wilson said. “When he gets mad, it’s big news in the courthouse because it’s so rare that that happens.”

Lyman also presided over civil and criminal cases two or three days a week in Pagosa Springs, 60 miles east of Durango, in Archuleta County. He stayed in a motel room those nights, and it was a “great sacrifice” to him and his family, said Sr. Judge James Denvir, a retired Archuleta county judge.

“Very often, these small counties feel like they’re an afterthought,” Denvir said. “He went to all the restaurants and was very well known in the community. Even though I had been here since 1979, he probably knew a lot of people in Pagosa Springs better than I did because he would see them and people liked him so much.”

Judges must make tough decisions that are inevitably going to disappoint litigants, but Denvir said he’s unaware of any situation where people didn’t trust Lyman’s fairness.

“Primarily, I think what he brought was a real down-to-earth sense of people and their problems, and trying to bring common-sense solutions to those problems,” Denvir said. “He has a tremendous empathy for people and fairness, and he shows that in terms of how he did his job as a judge.”

Said Lyman: “I just hope I’ve lived up to those people’s expectations of me.”

shane@durangoherald.com