A former colleague of Judge Timothy Maher, a federal jurist who shot himself with a rifle Aug. 24 after a prolonged standoff with police, is speaking out about events leading to the incident.

“He wasn’t some maniac running around,” retired Social Security Judge Thomas Snook said about Maher, who had been arrested days earlier on a charge of aggravated assault with a firearm after a domestic dispute at a home in El Portal. “I was very disappointed to read that he wasn’t Baker Acted.”