Douglas R. Taylor

 

Douglas R. Taylor, a Rockville lawyer and former Defense Department administrative law judge, died Sept. 21 at Montgomery Hospice’s Casey House in Rockville. He was 72. The cause was cancer, said a son, Richard Taylor.

During the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Taylor had a law practice in Rockville. He handled civil, criminal and family law cases. He closed his office in 1988 and was an administrative law judge with the Department of Defense for four years.

In 1993, he resumed a legal practice in Kensington, representing a range of clients, many of whom were down on their luck and whom he represented without charge, his family said. He continued working until shortly before his death.

Douglas Richard Taylor was born in Pittsburgh and moved to the Washington area in the late 1950s. He graduated from Northwood High School in Silver Spring, Md., in 1959, from the University of Maryland in 1963 and from George Washington University’s law school in 1966. He also served in the Air Force Reserve.

Mr. Taylor was a Silver Spring resident and a member and elder of Knox Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Silver Spring. He was a golfer and tennis player.

Survivors include his wife of 47 years, Susan Marie Witmer of Silver Spring; three children, Lisa T. Johns of Gaithersburg, Md., Richard Taylor of Arlington County and Dave Taylor of Los Angeles; two sisters, Gail T. Adams of Annandale, Va., and Georgia Taylor of Ashburn, Va.; and three grandchildren.