A man who loved helping people: That's how friends are remembering longtime judge James Tormey — who passed away Saturday at the age of 68.

Judge Tormey spent decades serving the Central New York community, as 5th District Administrative Judge and justice of the Supreme Court.

He was born in Syracuse and was also elected to Syracuse City Court.

Onondaga County Supreme Court Justice Gerard Neri says his friend established many programs in the local legal system to help others — including centralized arraignment programs to arraign people in the middle of the night.

Tormey leaves behind his wife, two children, and three grandchildren, along with a lasting legacy.

"We had a saying in [the] adminstration that sometimes it's tough to adminster because people don't realize we are trying to do something to help them. But, he always had a saying: 'We are going to help people, help themselves, [whether] they want to or not.'

And he was great at it. Shook hands with everybody. You could talk to any officer or anybody on the street. He would sit on the bench outside and talk to people, it's just how he was," Neri said. 

Onondaga County District Attorney Bill Fitzpatrick also spoke on Tormey's passing. The DA was his roommate in Law School at Syracuse University.

"He was bigger than life. If you didn't know where you stood with Judge Tormey, you weren't listening. I will miss him terribly," Fitzpatrick said.