So Deehl turned him down. He also never tried for Circuit Court, because he liked County Court.

In 1992, Deehl transitioned from “active’’ to “senior,’’ filling in as needed on the bench.

“I have no regrets. I’ve had a great life,” he told the Review. “I don’t know how much longer I’ve got, but I’ll enjoy each day.”

Deehl tried to teach young lawyers and University of Miami law students, in litigation skills classes, both humility and efficiency.

Eleventh Circuit Judge Don Cohn, a longtime friend, said he still tries to keep Deehl in mind when he’s on the bench.

“I try to remember things he said, and that I need to act the way he acted,’’ said Cohn. “He used to say that unless you can explain something in simple terms, you don’t understand it yourself. He’d take a very complicated situation and narrow it down to something you could understand, and he was on even keel all the time.’’

He could be “fatherly’’ from the bench, said Cohn, telling young prostitutes that they would end up in a bad way if they didn’t leave the streets.

“He always tried to see beyond the particular case to the individual...You knew he was sincere. He really cared about people. He was a very vibrant spirit. You trusted him.’’

State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle recalled Deehl’s courtroom as “a classroom for all of us on how to act as a trial lawyer — a law school PhD’’ in the days when law schools didn’t teach such things.

She said that he told young lawyers not to take shortcuts, but to “do it right...He was good on the law, he did his homework, he would rule with kindness and dignity.’’

Deehl refused to “suck up to lawyers’’ for campaign contributions, his son said. Instead, he used GI Bill benefits to buy real estate. Over time he accumulated enough to “plunk down $100,000 in a bank account’’ before every election, which would scare off opponents.

Deehl didn’t like Bar Association judicial evaluation polls, and wrote several letters to the editor of the Miami Herald about them.

In 1984 he wrote: “It is certainly no secret that most funds in judicial races come from attorneys, law firms, bail bondsmen, and others who want a friend in the court. Fortunately, most judges after being elected can be fair and impartial. But some would contend that a decision in a close factual matter would go to the contributor and against the attorney who contributed to his opponent even though that may not have been the case...”

“Merely putting on the black robe does not a judge make. Many years of judicial experience and continuing judicial education mold a qualified person into a good judge.”

In addition to his son, Deehl is survived by daughters Janet Deehl Schwartz and Theresa Miller. He will be buried next to his wife in Miami.

Memorial services are pending. The family suggests donations in his memory to the Unitarian Universalist Church, the University of Miami’s School of Law trial skills program, and History Miami, which will receive his papers.