Torpy: ‘I’ve shot better men than you’
You can’t make up stories like the reality that was Henriek Szczukowski, a Polish Jew who often remarked on his good luck for leaving his homeland before Hitler arrived.
He grew up to be Herbert Shafer, a Georgia lawyer who barely reached 5 feet but was aggressively unafraid of judges, prosecutors or even his clients, who included Mafiosos.
Herb was a constitutional rights zealot, a serial letter-to-the-editor writer and a lawyer ready to throw down with authorities. He figured that losing family members to the Nazi regime fomented such strong feelings.
In recent days, he was 94 and sick, and I meant to visit him. But you know how that story goes …
Read it, exclusively on MyAjc.com.
About the Author
Bill Torpy continues to contribute columns to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution since retiring in 2025. The Chicago native started covering metro Atlanta for the AJC in 1990.
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