BY JIM BARON

PAWTUCKET — Having put in the years required to collect a full pension some time ago, Superior Court Magistrate Joseph Keough says, “I have been working for free for the last few years.”

He officially retired earlier this month saying, “It was about my time. I didn’t stand to gain anything by continuing to work.” It was something of a defensive move, Keough explained. Once he is off the payroll, he believes his retirement benefits will be safe from any cuts that may or may not come as Governor Carcieri and the General Assembly prepare to attack massive budget deficits in the current year and next year.
So what would he like to do now that he has filed his retirement papers?
“I am hoping to get called back so I can continue working for free, just for something to do, Keough, 67, told The Times. “I’m hoping that is going to happen and I think it will as long as the presiding justice (Joseph Rodgers) is there.”
Keough said Rogers brought him on as a magistrate 11 years ago, for the purpose of clearing a backlog of about 5,000 victim restitution cases, a job they estimated would take about three years. When it was done even sooner than that, he recalled, “Justice Rodgers had enough confidence in me to place me in every calendar in the Superior Court” over the next decade.
Keough earned a reputation for being tough on the bench.
“There are a lot of people in Cranston (at the ACI) who won’t be broken hearted to see me go,” he laughed. “But I think I was fair. To run that criminal calendar in Courtroom 9, you have to be tough. You have to keep people’s feet to the fire. You want to keep everybody working, you want to keep jurors working, it’s something that requires you to push people.”
Keough is joining an exodus from the state judiciary. Supreme Court Chief Justice Frank Williams announced his retirement recently as did Family Court Judge Howard Lipsey. District Court Judge Albert DiRobbio died just a few days after the death of Family Court Judge Gilbert Rocha.
Before becoming a magistrate, Keough spent a total of 18 years as a judge in the Pawtucket Municipal Court. His tenure was interrupted because he did not support the candidacy of former Mayor Brian Sarault, so Sarault replaced him. But once Sarault resigned after being arrested on corruption charges that eventually sent him to jail, new Mayor Robert Metivier put Keough back in charge of the city court.
Even though he is stepping down as magistrate, Keough won’t he heading to warmer climes in his golden years. “I was born in Pawtucket, raised in Pawtucket and I think it is too late for me to leave Pawtucket at this juncture.”
Keough attended Pawtucket’s St. Raphael Academy, earned his BA in economics at Providence College and graduated from Suffolk University Law School.
He said he doesn’t expect to return to the private practice of law, although his son, Joseph Jr., is maintaining the family business from his Armistice Boulevard office and has invited him to come back.
As an attorney, Keough represented several professional athletes, including Lincoln’s Ross Brooks, a Boston Bruins goaltender and Dave Forbes, a Bruins forward charged with aggravated assault after allegedly striking another player with the butt end of his stick. In a trial in Minnesota, Forbes was acquitted when the jury could not reach a verdict.
Keough said he found he had to draw the line between representing athletes as an attorney and being an agent. “You have to do some things as an agent that would be violating your job as an attorney,” he said.
Among other ventures with Brooks, Keough promoted exhibition games by the Boston Bruins and Boston Celtics in Providence.
“I’ve had an interesting, well-rounded career,” he said.