Joseph Paul Lomio, Law Library director, dies at 64

After a brief illness, Joseph Paul Lomio, director of Stanford’s Robert Crown Law Library since 2005, passed away at his home in Palo Alto on March 6.

Lomio played key roles in launching the Law Library’s digital reserves and its earliest online initiative, the Women’s Legal History Biography Project. He also was a prominent member of the team that developed the Stanford Securities Class Action Clearinghouse, a resource recognized by the Smithsonian Institution as a “visionary use of information technology in the field of education and academia.”

In 1994, Lomio won the Marshall D. O’Neil Award for outstanding contributions to the University’s research mission. He also chaired the Stanford University Public Services Coordinating Council in 1989, seven years after initially joining the Law Library staff as a reference librarian in 1982.

Lomio earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from St. Bonaventure University in 1972, a law degree from Gonzaga University in 1978, a master’s degree in law from the University of Washington in 1979 and a master’s in library science from the Catholic University of America in 1982. Between earning these degrees he served as a platoon leader with the U.S. army from 1972 to 1975 and worked as a guardian-ad-litem and clerk in King County, Washington, after being admitted to the Washington State Bar Association in 1978.

In addition to his career at the Law Library, Lomio enjoyed physical activities, such as working out at gyms on Stanford campus and hiking in the Foothills. He was a dedicated enthusiast of Stanford sports, holding women’s basketball season tickets for 28 years.

Lomio is survived by his wife Sharon Inouye and daughter Rita Lomio ’04 M.A. ’12. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations to an animal welfare society of the well-wisher’s choosing, as a tribute to Lomio’s love for all living creatures.

Contact Sarah Moore at smoore6 ‘at’ stanford.edu.