THE ED MYLETT SHOW - Judge Frank Caprio’s Final Interview: A Legacy of Love, Faith & Compassion

Episode Date: September 16, 2025

The Final Words of Judge Frank Caprio: A Farewell Gift of Grace and LegacyEvery once in a while, you find yourself in a conversation that you know will live in your heart forever. This episode is one of those conversations. It is the final interview with Judge Frank Caprio—“America’s Nicest Judge”—a man whose compassion and kindness in the courtroom have inspired millions around the globe. What you’ll hear today are not just stories, but the lasting words of a man reflecting on his life, his faith, and the legacy he hopes to leave behind. Judge Caprio shares openly about the lessons his immigrant parents taught him, the role of humility and faith in his life, and why he chose compassion when the world often demanded judgment. This is not just an interview—it’s his farewell message, a parting gift of wisdom on how to live a life filled with love, service, and grace. As I sat across from him, I couldn’t escape the gravity of the moment. His words carried the weight of finality—reminders not just of what he’s done, but of who he has been. Judge Caprio leaves behind more than rulings and courtroom moments; he leaves behind a legacy of humanity, showing us that the greatest measure of our lives is found in how we treat others. Key Takeaways:• Why compassion is Judge Caprio’s definition of true justice• The values his parents passed down that shaped his entire life• Why faith and humility guided every decision he made• What it means to leave behind a lasting legacy of kindness• How one life lived with love can inspire millionsThis episode is one I’ll never forget. It’s a chance for you and me to hear Judge Caprio’s final reflections, to be moved by his example, and to take his last words with us as a call to live with more love, more grace, and more compassion in everything we do.— Max Out  If Judge Caprio’s story has inspired you and you’d like to honor his legacy, you can donate to support his favorite causes here: The Filomena Fund and PanCan  ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠👉 SUBSCRIBE TO ED'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL NOW 👈⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   → → → CONNECT WITH ED MYLETT ON SOCIAL MEDIA: ← ← ←  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠INSTAGRAM⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠FACEBOOK⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LINKEDIN⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠   ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  ➡️ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠WEBSITE⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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This is the admirer show. Hey everybody. So I come with you with sort of mixed emotions today. I'm both excited and at the same time grieving a little bit like millions of other people are. So today I'm going to share with you a conversation with the beautiful soul that was Judge Frank Caprio. And ironically, we didn't know it at the time, but this was the last interview of this precious man's life. So I'm honored to share it with you. I'm also honored to let you know that on behalf of his family, we're going to make a donation to his favorite cause. And if you're interested in donating along with us, you can click the link below or in the show notes. But this is a beautiful

conversation with a brilliant and gentle, generous man. And I'm so honored that I got to share the final one of his life with all of you. God bless you, everybody. Enjoy this special conversation with a beautiful man. All right, welcome back to this show, everybody. So today's a special date for me. This is somebody that I've admired from a distance for, it's just an extremely long time. He's an internet sensation, but he's 88 years old. You all know who he is. Immediately you'll recognize his voice. If you're on YouTube, you'll recognize his face.

I consider him a kindness broker, a kindness broker. And somebody that if you just watched him, I think you just live better if you emulated many of the things that he does in his life. And he's coming to us today on a day. I think he's feeling his best. He's also been going through a cancer battle. I asked him how he was one to ten. He said a five. I said, well, by the time we're done, we're getting you to at least a 6.2. So he's sucking it up for us today on a day where he's not feeling his best as well. But he has a way to always make other people feel their best, even when he's not feeling his best. And he'll do that for all of you today, for millions of you around the world. This is the great Judge Frank Caprio joining us today.

Judge Frank, thank you for being here today. It's an honor to have you. Well, thank you for the opportunity. It's my son, Frank, is here. And we got one of the producers that's been with my dad from day one. I mean, nominated four times, Taylor. My mom wants to say hello. Hi, Mom.

How are you? How are you? Well, we're going to hold your whole family up in some prayer, like literally right when this thing's over with. So we get a little comfort and a little strength coming your way. That's good. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing him with us today. I know it wasn't easy and we're very, very grateful.

So thank you. Let's go back a long time. When you're 88, you can go back a long time, right? We could go through your upbringing and whatnot, but I want to first touch on a day, because it just struck my heart. I actually was reading about it. I got teary-eyed. You as a little boy and your grandmother, ironically, of all places, is in court.

And that day kind of made an imprint on you for the rest of your life. Never knowing at that age, you'd end up spending a lot of your life in courtrooms. You were just a little boy at the time, but maybe you could just set the stage for maybe just a lesson in your life that you learned very young in a place that you spent a lot of time teaching other people lessons. That was actually my father who was in court with his father. Okay. And my grandfather was a fruit peddler from Italy. Ah, okay. As was my father.

Okay. I'm first generation here. My grandfather and a number of his buddies. after peddling fruit all day decided they'd play some cards and they got a little rowdy and my grandfather got arrested and my father was one of ten children

and so my grandmother was notified that the following day she had to be in court because her husband got arrested literally she doesn't understand the process here so she thinks she needs a lot of money to get her husband out of jail so she goes to all the other fruit peddlers

and borrows money from them. And the following day, she brings my father, because she didn't speak English. She brings my father, who was in his early teens at the time, she brings my father as the interpreter. Oh, my goodness. Okay, so your dad's the little boy? My dad is the little boy, right?

And what did he see that day? My grandmother is there with my dad in court, and my grandfather's been in the cell all night, you know, so they call his case. and my grandfather comes from the cell and he's disheveled and they seat him down and my grandmother gets so excited

she's in this strange court but what she did was the night before she went out and borrowed money from all of the other fruit veterans thinking that she was going to need some money to get her husband out of jail and so as soon as they bring my grandfather up my father is the interpreter

because my grandmother doesn't speak English and she says she has a handful of money that she borrowed from the Federalers. And she says, please, Judge, please, no jail. I got a pneumonia. It's an interesting story

because my father was one of ten children and they all told this story with such reverence for that judge. My father, every time he discussed this judge, here's how he described him, that great white-haired Irish judge. That great white-haired Irish judge.

Why was he great? Was he kind to your grandmother? My grandmother got up and said, here's the money. The judge said, to my father, and are you going to interpret it for your mom? And he says, yes. He says, tell your mother that I'm going to send her husband home, and I want her to cook him a good meal. He's a good man, and he had one bad day, and I'm not going to keep him here, but I want you to go home with him and take care of him.

Wow. That one episode changed the view. of justice with all 10 children. I heard that story when I was a kid. It changed my view from the time I was a youngster, you know. And I always remember that story. And interestingly, in Providence, an area of immigrants, particularly Latin American.

And I could review that story a thousand times over with those that came before me. But I always remembered the impact that had in my family. that upbringing of yours, this is interesting for people to hear, just perspective. Because you don't hear this anymore. Everything on Instagram now is get your Lamborghini, be a rich guy, you know, get on the boat and sell the dream, you know, and you said, you know, the way you grew up, you're poor. And you actually called that a privilege.

Do you really mean that? And if you do mean it, what was the privilege of being poor? It's true. I did have the privilege of being brought or poor because I appreciated because of my upbringing with both parents, you know, who are immigrants, the fabric of America and the riches that we have here, not so much in money, but in what we were entitled to and how we're treated it. And my father constantly preached that, but what a great country this was, and that we had an opportunity. And I can remember, you know, just simple little things that he, when I was 10 years old,

he said to me, someday you're going to be a lawyer. And it was like an edict, you know, from above. I never wanted to be anything else but a lawyer from the time I was 10 years old. Did you ever think when you were going to become a lawyer that you'd end up being a judge? I mean, there was no internet at the time. But, I mean, did you have a sense that that's something

that maybe your life mattered, that you wanted to have an impact in the world? Was that? It was not one of my goals. They never dawned upon me. You have to understand. We lived in what they call a cold war. water flat, which means we didn't have hot running water. And it was just the fact that I was going

to be a lawyer was so monumental to me. So we never went to the next step. After that, what was going to happen? What was going to happen naturally, obviously? You can get protein at home or a protein latte at Tim's. No powders, no blenders, no shakers. Starting at 17 grams per medium latte, Tim's new protein lattes, protein without all the work, at participating restaurants in Canada. You know, and I would watch your clips. By the way, I watch very few things on social media, so you're all over my social media feed

because I clicked on these clips of you all the time. I feel like I really know you very well. And, you know, I wanted to ask you, this isn't in the book, but it's something I'm just curious about. You have kept, since that story you learned as a little boy about the judge and your family, you've kept this,

I'd call it like an outlook on, humanity that is favorable and positive and loving this is a hard question frank but i'm curious sir that's got to be hard you know and you're in a courtroom so you're mainly seeing people who are accounting for one of their bigger mistakes in their life you're not seeing them on their best day necessarily and in the world today you know in social media or tv it's it's just so much negativity all the time that it can sour you on people you know on life And I don't think anybody would blame you as a judge day after day hearing people's stories of, you know, why they've made this mistake or committed this crime. How did you, or did you keep this outlook that people are good in general and that we should treat them well?

I was very fortunate that it wasn't only my father with my mother as well. You know, my mother was known in the neighborhood for feeding people that were hungry. If you were hungry, come to my house. Don't worry. You get a nice meal. And it was always like, let's help other people. But I was saying that, but anyone that wasn't in the stress was stopped by our house, and they were helped. My father, one of his jobs was he was a milkman.

He'd wake my brother and I up at 4 in the morning. He'd go to work on the truck. Oh, yeah. If you don't want to do this the rest of your wife, make sure you stay in school. But I learned something from that. If someone could not pay their milk bill, the company had a pop. that after three weeks you stopped delivery, that was their policy. His policy was, if they had children, he would never stop the milk.

He didn't care what the company policy was. And many times he'd take money out of his own pocket and say they're making an effort to pay. Oh, my gosh. So these were the examples that I saw, you know, by way of example, these weren't speeches that were given to me. So it wasn't the situation where I was giving a speech saying do A and my parents did B. you know never made the speech all they did was they they did they did a i've always said with parents a lot of the things of their parents it's caught not taught we catch it because we see it from them it's different than hearing a speech like some guy like me could give from a stage or

something like that i was thinking about all the stories that by the way his book guys i want to make sure that i give him proper credit for this book by the way his nickname is america's nicest judge. But the book is called Compassion in the Court, Life-Changing Stories from America's Nicest Judge. He's just one of America's kindest people. There he is. He's holding it. And I want to make sure. You've learned the social media game for sure. I want to make sure that you guys all get this, because these are lessons that, you know, they're timeless. And in a time like we're in today, they're mandatory. And the other thing I like about you, you're transparent. You're not perfect. you've made mistakes in your life as well

and I was thinking about about your first day as a judge and you have a story from that day your very first day that I think you tended to regret a little bit of something from that day and I think it just goes to show you that you can learn lessons in life if you don't handle things perfectly the first time too

if you wouldn't mind sharing that story my first day on the court I asked my dad if he would come down you know I'm a judge now you know I want my dad to see me up on the bench and this woman came in and she had three or four kids I'm not sure how many and she had

traffic violations of somewhere around $300 to $400 and she was the most arrogant person you can imagine so she said she's in the court I'm trying to help her and she says

I just can't pay it I'm not paying it I don't have the money you know and the more I try to help her the more arrogant she became and so then she became arrogant and I became a little upset and I find her the full fine I gave her penalties I gave her everything and now the court is over and I'm so proud of myself you know my dad was there and my first day as a judge and I uh I was in my judge's chambers and I said to the bail of bring my dad in please I want to talk to him so I'm all smiles dad

how did I do? He looked at me, he says, how did you do? How did you do? He said, that woman, I said, what woman? The woman that had the three or four kids, he says, how could you do that? You can't do that to people? I said, she was so arrogant. She was rude. He said, she was scared. He said, do you know now that maybe she can't feed her kids tonight? Maybe she can't pay her rent. Maybe she can't pay one of her bills. They'll turn the electricity off. You can't treat people that way. you weren't brought up that way. That set the stage for my entire judgeship that first day on the bench with my dad

giving me hell. That is a great story. I was telling my wife, I'm talking about here today. It's like, I haven't seen you this excited in a while, you know? And I said it's just someone that I admire. And one thing my dad had, my dad was a recovering alcoholic, by the way, Judge. So he ended up being sober for 35 years. So I saw two dads.

I saw the dad that wasn't living so good. And then I saw the dad that was. But no matter whether he had been drinking or not drinking, he was always giving and kind. And I think what I admire in you is I see the best of my dad and you. And I want you to talk about something. I'll say it and then you tell me if I'm wrong. But my dad, when I'd see people, it was a homeless guy on the street and I'm a little boy. I go, dad, that guy's got two arms and two legs.

like why isn't he out getting a job for his family or why has he got his kids and no matter what the situation was ever my dad would say eddie um put yourself in their shoes try to walk in their shoes and i don't think i've really even done a very good job of that in my life i mean maybe as i've gotten the older i have but you seem to me to almost when you're talking to someone or hearing their case or just interacting you put yourself in their shoes well am i right about that you're smiling so I was just about ready to give you that answer. And that's exactly what I did. I always placed myself in the shoes of the person that was before me, you know,

because that first case in the court, when my father chastised me, you know, taught me so much away. And he went on explaining to me, you know, you don't know what their life is like. Maybe she can't feed her kids tonight and so forth. And those were his words. Put yourself in her shoes. And I never forgot that. And I try to follow that as long as I was on the bench. Did you ever go through a time in your life, Judge, honestly, where you had,

you seem to be egoless almost. And I'm sure that there have been times in your life where, you know, as a young man in your 30s or 40s or 50s in the prime of your career and you're probably doing very well as a lawyer or whatever it was. Have you always been humble or is this something you've had to work on? Because there's people listening to the show, frankly, that they're starting to have some success. And when you start to have some success or a couple bucks or some notoriety,

you can begin to feel pretty good about yourself. Did you ever go through a season like that? And it was ever a time that you had to be reminded of where you come from? Have you always held on it? You're laughing again. So I guess there's an answer. Well, you know, my dad would wake my brother and I up at 4 in the morning to help him on the milk truck.

Yep. He would say, if you don't want to do this the rest of your life, you better stay in college. You better go to college. And then I saw how he treated. people who couldn't pay their milk bill, even though his company was a major company would demand that after a period of time, two or three weeks, if they didn't pay the bill, that he was ordered to stop the milk. That was their rule. His rule was if they had children, he never stopped the milk. And many times he put money out of his own pocket and say they're

trying to pay. But he never gave me lessons in saying, this is how you treat people, and this is how you treat people. But he did it by way of example. So, I lived that. I saw how my dad treated people. I saw how my mom treated people. She fed people that were hungry. So all of that was the great learning experience for me. But it wasn't a situation where I was sat down and said,

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And real-time insights so you know what's working, what's not, and what's next. Because when you're doing big things, your tools should to. Visit square.ca to get started. You've had a bout with some health the last while now. And if I be serious with you, I'm curious. like advice from a wise man like we're all in the midst of doing our lives right now they're listening to the show or watching it

and I hope you have 20 more years but let's assume that you're in the final quarter right you know later in life what do you believe if you could give us wisdom and you could speak to someone younger what makes a good life what makes a good life for you a good life is service to others

that's a good life self-grandizement is not a good life personal wealth is not a good life but treating others with respect and dignity and helping when you can that's a good life that's right to the point is there ever a story in court that you

even to this day think of that brings you to tears someone in front of you that you thought my gosh this poor person is there one that stands out above others or a one that stands out well I have several Well, I'll tell you, one woman came in and she couldn't pay her bill

and she actually became a little arrogant and the next thing I know she told me that her child had died the day before and so I've had several situations like that. So my point is, you know, I know people have said to me, the law is the law, you know, and that doesn't make any difference.

That's their rule. My rule is, you know, I'm dealing with another human being and I take all of those facts. practice is in the consideration. You say compassion is action. What does that mean? Well, a lot of people talk compassion.

Yeah. But acting on compassion is something different. You know, if you see a person who's on their luck and they can't afford a meal for their family, you tell everybody, boy, that poor family is so terrible, you know, they can't feed their children. That's not active compassion. Active compassion is you helped them out. when you look at uh not to be political but so we're not going to be political here i don't do that here

but i consider you like a leader you led the courtroom when you were in it and then you know hundreds of millions of views of clips of you and a lot of people that watch my show or listen to it are leaders of a family or they're leaders of their business or they're aspiring leaders and it just seems like compassion, kindness, empathy seems to be maybe not as rewarded or as acknowledged as a priority as it once was and should be. And it's not always the examples we see from either political party or around the world. I just wonder what you think makes a great leader. And I know that's not in the book, but it's a question I wanted to ask you because I consider

you someone who's led in many different areas of your life. You've led your family. You've led in the courtroom. You've been a leader for people's emotions and the way they view the world on social media. We think makes a great leader. At the end of the day, we're judged by how we treat others. That's reading. And how we treat others is doing, it's by way of example.

And that's how we treat others. I know so many instances where people preach one thing and treat people differently. you know and I see it on the I see it on the bench unfortunately with judges that happens you know so but I think at the end of the day how we treat other people is really how we're going to be judged when you read your work there's a lot of family in it and I'll tell you a thing on my dad I wanted to ask you about I wish I could ask my dad this and I can't so I'm asking you as I got older I would look at my dad and he didn't have a lot of friends he had some but not a lot and I used to think you know how do you get through life i'm not have 85 or 90 or 100 friends you know like how

is that is when i was younger and then uh i asked my dad said dad how come you don't have any friends he goes you know eddie friends are important but family's different and and uh family is what you're going to have as you get older maybe there's a few friends that are chosen family but it's family and makes me emotional to say this to you but as i've gotten older my friend's circle is shrunk considerably there's there's not as many that are there's forever. They're there for a season in life. And there's just these values in life that I feel like were more centrist 40, 50, 60 years ago, which was family. And no one seems to not be talked about anymore. And I'm reading your book and I'm like, family this, family this. You know, your dad in the

book is in there throughout and your mom. And I'm just wondering what you would say to us listening to these wise words about the importance of family. The basic unit of society is the family unit. It's the question about that. And our first teachers in life are our parents. They're teaching us by way of example on how they treat other people. At the end of the day, we're judged not by how much money we make, but about how much we help others.

That's basically what it's all about, service to others. Do you think Tupp would be proud of you? I hope so. I know that. Tup is his dad, by the way. He was proud of me, the first day I came to court. I'm not sure about after that. No, he was very proud of me.

Tup was a very unique individual. He would help anybody and everybody. That was his life. His motto was be of service to others. Well, I think he's damn proud of you. I know our time's limited, but I want to ask you about cycles. You know, they run through families too. And I assume, you know, when you're in court, there's some through lines that are common, not always, but poverty, addiction, trauma, stress.

You've seen a lot of that. What do you think can break that cycle more powerfully than a courtroom or a law can? Is there something that can break through those cycles? I've said earlier, the basic unit of society is the family unit, and that's where it all comes from. It's very difficult to be exposed as a youngster in the early years of your life to be exposed and seeing certain behavior. You know, that's not good. And then all of a sudden, you don't treat people that way.

Our greatest goal in life is to be of service to others. So many times people don't have that opportunity to have a loving house, a loving father, a loving mother, loving grandparents, loving cousins. My mother was one of eight. My father was one of ten. I had over 40 cousins. I had 18 aunts and uncles. And I can say without fear of contradiction that at any time,

I could walk into any of my house or uncle's houses and say, I'm hungry and I get fed. And if I didn't say I was hungry, they'd ask me, are you hungry? That sounds like my family too. This is the hardest question you're going to get asked in any of your interviews because it's not in the book, so I'm going to push you on a day you're not even feeling your best, but I'm going to push you. Is there something that you believed when you were young that you changed your mind about as you got older and you don't believe

anymore and you've changed your belief about something? So the book's about lessons you learned when you were young through your upbringing, but is there something you as a little boy or a young man or early in your career believed that was important that you, you know, you, you were a little boy or a young man, or early in your career believed that was important that you no longer believe, that you changed your mind about? Well, first of all, I've said this in so many different ways and so many times is that my big experiences in life came from my dad and how I was brought up from my mother and my father. And those are lessons that you just don't discard.

They're deeply embedded in me for the rest of my life. and I try to display those qualities with my children as well I'm not sure if I was successful but I think I was I was sick of hearing people see my kids I just can't control my kids

when you can't control your kids you know then I you know and then get into a long conversation how do you treat your kids what do you do for them do you take them out you know do you ask them how they're feeling

do you spend special time with them do you take the Fenway Park I mean do you do all of this stuff you know that's what family life is all about, showing love, it's not enough to say to the kids before I go to bed and that I love you. And then during the day, ignore them. It's all in that personal relationship. I grew up knowing that no matter what the circumstances in life were, to make any difference what they were, that if I was in trouble, my father would be there

and my mother as well. I never was at that point, incidentally. I never was at that point. I think when you said that, I wonder how many people don't feel that, don't have that. No, I was going to say, I think the disintegration of the family unit is the sin of this country. Gosh, I think you're right. I think you're right. Last question for you. By the way, God bless you. You're just such a special man.

I'm going to pray that you feel a little bit better, too. I want you to know that. Praying. I will. I'll keep praying. I know it's a rough time. How do you want to be remembered? Or do you not care?

I'm going to be remembered as someone that helped other people. Let me simply. What a big long speech? Someone who helped others, particularly those in need. I want to tell you something. You did that today, and you weren't feeling up to it. And, you know, you said something earlier. People talk a good talk.

But at 88 years old and going through what you're going through in your health right now and not feeling your best today, you do it unconditionally. And that's character. It's not just when you feel like it or when conditions are great or when people treat you kindly to you so you treat them kindly back. It's unconditional. And I'm so honored I got time with you today. Thank you for helping so many people today, Judge. And I want to make sure everybody holds you up in prayer, number one.

And number two, since we're in the business of books, let's make sure they go get compassion in the court. Hold it up again, young man. There it is. I just happened to have one here. Life-changing stories from America's nicest judge, and maybe the nicest person I've ever met, too. So Judge Frank Caprio, thank you for today. God bless you, my friend.

Thank you very much. All right, everybody. So what a gift. And I have to tell you, I've done a lot of interviews in my life, and his inherent goodness shined through, even as he was going through what was a very painful day, to be candid with you. I asked him multiple times before we recorded that day, do you want to do this? And this beautiful man said, absolutely, yes.

He powered through all of the discomfort and lost his life just several days after that conversation. That's how you know you want to have a life of service. And he told us all in that interview, justice without compassion, isn't justice at all. And there's anything he represented, it was compassion. And you saw that shine through in the interview. And again, I just want to remind you that we're going to make a donation to his favorite cause and charity. on behalf of our organization, and you're welcome to do the same

by clicking the link that you see in your show notes or below here. I just want to say God bless you to everybody, and I hope you share this episode with as many people as you possibly can to honor this great man. God bless you. This is the Edmireland Show.