[This story was updated to correct a typo.]
On Jan. 11, shortly after ensuring he made it to his 71st birthday, Dr. Stephen L. Read, one of the nation’s most influential geriatric and forensic psychiatrists — whose clinical work helped heal thousands of elderly and vets, academic service fostered the next generation of leaders in his field, and testimony impacted the elder years of many powerful across the country — died peacefully in his home on Lake Merritt in Oakland, Calif. surrounded by his family and friends, all who knew him adoringly as “Papa.” His family reports the cause of death as pancreatic cancer.
Stephen Lynn Read was born on Jan. 10, 1948 to Warren and Elizabeth Read. He grew up in Tulsa, Okla. Driven by boundless intellectual capacity, scientific curiosity, and passion for life, he excelled through school only to turn down full ride offers at multiple prestigious schools, believing anything he did there would be used in Vietnam. After a brief stint at Rice University in Houston, he arrived in California in 1969 where he eventually graduated from Berkeley. He soon found himself in Seattle where he met the love of his life, the artist Diana Kos. Stephen fell passionately for Diana’s artistic vision and motherly instincts, enjoying and nurturing both for the rest of his life.
Post medical school and with two sons, the couple settled in the greater LA area, in Torrance, where Dr. Read concluded his residency at the nearby Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, inspiring a life-time commitment to mental health. It was there that he began a multi-faceted career as clinician, professor, and expert witness. Dr. Read loved being a doctor, serving our nation’s vets for three decades as a staff psychiatrist with Veterans Affairs and maintaining a private practice that kept him close to patients. He also loved to teach and took great pride in helping develop the field of geriatric and later forensic psychiatry at UCLA, helping foster the next generation of clinicians in the area. Along the way, he served as the founding medical director of the John Douglas French Center for Alzheimer’s Disease in Orange County, appearing on CBS’ Good Morning America in 1988 to talk about one of his passions, long-term care for the elderly.
He brought all this experience together to become one of LA and the nation’s leading geriatric and forensic psychiatrists. From the mid-’90s until his diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and retirement in 2016, Dr. Read built a worldwide reputation as an expert in the areas of elder abuse, capacity, and undue influence. Retained in more than 1,100 cases, his powerful and judicious testimony was always written with the finest attention to fairness in form and content and delivered in court with impact that led to a reputation that preceded itself and helped determine the fate and fortunes of some of our nation’s most powerful elderly.
To his children and later to much of the world outside of work, however, Dr. Read was affectionately known as “Papa,” an homage to his French heritage. He had a sweet voice for lullabies, loved playing sports and was always teaching his children; more than just knowledge, he taught them how to learn.
His decades of work with older people facing challenging end-of-life situations taught him to think very carefully about the final phase of his own life. While unexpectedly having to battle pancreatic cancer for the past couple years, he did so exactly as he wanted: with the unflagging attention and tender love of his wife; playful moments with his three granddaughters; great conversations with friends new and old; incredible care from world class institutions with life-time colleagues; and the strong support of the families of his two sons, one he lived next door to and one who lived just up the hill.
In addition to his wife, Diana, Stephen is survived by his eldest son, Jonathan Kos-Read (Li Zhiyin) and two granddaughters, Roxanne, 11, and Persephone, 6; his younger son, Isaac Kos-Read (Mary Massella) and granddaughter Tess Abella, also 6; mother, Elizabeth Read; and sisters, Martha Read (June BlueSpruce) and Mary Read (Victoria Jackson, dec.). Dr. Read’s legacy as a medical doctor lives on through many proteges, but especially two Marys: his youngest sister, who is now the better known “Dr. Read” at Harbor-UCLA, and his daughter-in-law, a UCSF nurse practitioner who works in community health in Oakland.
His home and final resting place is beside Lake Merritt, which he loved to look out on, with its dancing birds and people, yet he chose to take his last breath in a room in his home that was filled with nothing but views of the art of his loving wife, who held his hand until the end.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests support of for the UCSF Foundation, P.O. Box 45339, San Francisco, California, 94145-0339. Please designate on the memo line that the gift is in memory of Dr. Stephen Read to support pancreatic cancer research at the UCSF Pancreas Center. You can also give online by visiting makeagift.ucsf.edu/pancreascenter.