Cancer Survivor ... Dead Bodies
By Gregg Wendorf
Advance News Journal
This primary season that ended two weeks ago, Hidalgo County Precinct 2 Justice of the Peace and cancer survivor (liver and stomach) Bobby Contreras capped off his seventh win.
“It’s like my dad used to say, 'Bad weeds never die.'"
A judge with a sense of humor, which he needs to counter some of the unpleasant work he’s called on to perform — pronouncing someone dead.
“For some reason, most people seem to die at night,” he said, “so getting calls at 2 a.m. comes with the job.”
And of course, not everyone is so fortunate to die in a hospital bed or a hospice. Bodies found in a field, the result of a violent death, are far too common.
Or, for example, a body that has been lying dead in the summer heat indoors for two weeks with no AC, no family around to check on them. Lonely souls. Someone, a JP, has to go in and pronounce him/her dead, while the sight of maggots and the smell of decaying flesh would overcome most.
“People who say they want to be a justice of the peace often have no idea what this job entails,” said Contreras. “It’s not always easy.”
A few years ago, the brother of his longtime wife and high school sweetheart died in a car wreck in Edinburg. Contreras was the only JP around, and as he drove to the scene, he had no idea who the fatality was: His brother-in-law.
“That one hit me hard, but it’s all part of the job,” he said matter-of-factly, with a hint of the sad loss still sounding in his voice as he recounts the story.
Cancer Survivor
A 1968 graduate of PSJA ISD, Contreras had more than a few serious obstacles to face 12 years ago — Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, which included two tumors; one in his liver and one in his stomach.
In June 2012, he called The Advance to discount the rumors going around the coffee shops. Like Mark Twain once said, “Rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated.”
“You know how rumors are,” Contreras said. “Some of them already have me dead and buried. But I’m here to tell you, I’m still working on paperwork out of my house, and I’m still signing arrest warrants. I’m just not presiding over hearings or arraignments. And no, like some rumors have suggested, nothing is wrong with my heart, and I don’t have diabetes.”
At the time, Contreras was already being treated at MD Anderson in Houston. For nine months, every three weeks, he and his wife would make the drive for another round of chemo.
“The prognosis looks good,” he said in 2012. "The doctors think I should make a full recovery. I want to thank the three JPs who have been helping me out — Homer Jasso out of Edinburg, Luis Garza out of Mission, and Gilbert Saenz out of Weslaco.”
The support from friends and family was one of the main things that kept him going.
“The number of people willing to pray for you and send you well wishes while you’re battling a potentially fatal illness is pretty amazing,” he said at the time.
You hear the word “Cancer” as it relates to you, he said, and life takes on a whole new meaning.
“When a person can’t feel any worse, and trust me, if you hear the doctor utter the word 'cancer,' that’ll do it for you, but when you can’t feel any worse than you already are, that’s when family and friends matter the most. Plus, it helps to have some good doctors working on you, too.”
Twelve years later, going on his 24th year on the JP bench, Contreras served as a school board member at PSJA for 12 years prior to that, while working with the state as a social worker for 15 years.
The 2022 Election
A no-nonsense guy who excelled in football and track in high school, built like a brick house, solid as a rock, sporting a shaved head ever since chemo took what was left of his hair 12 years ago, Contreras keeps a low profile in local politics, save his own, as is befitting the office he holds. To stay in shape, he walks three miles a day and keeps his weight in check.
In the fall of 2022, a month before the November school board election, however, the previous PSJA ISD administration moved his daughter, Heather Contreras Peña, from her long-time job as an assistant principal at the Early College High School to another school with no warning, no reason. To this day, no one can really understand the ill-conceived move.
That move, deemed as disrespectful to his daughter, awoke the so-called sleeping bear in Bobby Contreras. When he got off work from his JP job, and in the early morning hours, he was already working the campaign trail, working to defeat the majority board slate, calling up registered voters, urging them to vote.
In the minds of many people, that was like awakening a sleeping bear. Why do it? If the previous administration had just left his daughter alone, Contreras would have stayed out of the 2022 school board race. Now (then), he was already on the phone at 7 in the morning, urging people to get out and vote. He was walking the campaign trail hot and heavy, and it paid off. The incumbents lost the election, and the district was reshaped, with a new board majority and superintendent, Dr. Alejandro Elias.
“Old friends,” said Contreras, “they’re a great part of what makes life so special.”
As the 2022 election showed, he apparently still has a lot of them. Friends. With the exception of the first primary in 2000, he’s run unopposed in all of the six subsequent Democrat Primaries.
This November, he faces Republican challenger Princess Anne Gonzalez.
"Getting diagnosed with cancer gives you a new perspective on life," he said. “Living through it makes you appreciate life even more. Not to mention the appreciation I have for the family and friends I love, as well as my (county) colleagues and staff who helped me with my court duties during the most difficult times.”