Austin lawyer Seana Willing remembers looking forward to her meeting with Mack Kidd, a well-regarded Texas appellate court judge who had arranged to meet with her on a Monday morning in 2005.

But Willing, the former head of the State Commission on Judicial Conduct who often met with judges who wanted to discuss ethical dilemmas, would never find out why Kidd wanted to meet. He took his own life the previous day.

“The odd thing was … I didn't know how he died until his ceremony,” said Willing, who considered Kidd, a justice on Austin's Third Court of Appeals, a friend. “Then I saw all of these people speak about him and it became apparent that he had taken his own life. That shocked me to the core.”