Obituary from 1988 San Antonio newspaper

James A. Winters was a federal judge specializing in immigration issues for 32 years.
In his most famous case, Winters ordered the deportation of Wolfgang Abel, a Soviet spy. When U-2 pilot Gary Powers was downed in the Soviet Union, the U.S. government exchanged Abel for Powers.

Winters died Saturday with Alzheimer's disease, which he contracted in the 1970s. For the last three years, he lived in a nursing home. He was 73.

Born in San Antonio, he was a member of the last graduating class from old Main Avenue High School.

Winters married Dorothy Fowler here in 1938. Winters attended night school at St. Mary's University earning his law degree in 1951, and his doctor of jurisprudence degree in 1970.

In 1942 Winters became an immigration inspector in Brownsville. The next year he was transferred back to San Antonio and became a deportation examiner and special inquiry officer.

Winters was sent to Seattle in 1955 as supervisor of immigration inspectors. He returned to San Antonio in 1956 to become the local immigration judge. He held this position until 1972, when he retired.

Travel was one of his pleasures and he took his wife with him for hearings in New York, Puerto Rico, California and Hawaii.

"When my husband was a young man, he took a career aptitude test, which suggested his capacity would be best fulfilled as a judge, a counselor or a minister, " said his wife.

"He did all of these things and excelled in everything. He was a deacon in the Church of Christ for five years and an elder for 25 years. For many years he taught an adult Bible class, and he preached also."

Winters served on the board of directors for the Medina Children's Home for 25 years.
"My husband exhibited great compassion and sympathy in his job," his wife said. "Even when he had to deport an alien who had come here to work to support his large family in Mexico, my husband would reach into his pocket and give him some of hi s own money."

Survivors are his wife; two sons, Kenneth Winters of Austin and Douglas Winters of Athens, Ga; a sister, Ethel Cook of San Antonio, and six grandchildren.
Services will be at 3 p.m. Tuesday in Sunset Funeral Chapel with Dempsey Simpson officiating. Burial will be in Sunset Memorial Park.

James A Winters