Greenbrier County native Fred J. Giggenbach, Jr., 46, has formally announced his campaign for circuit judge for the 11th judicial circuit covering Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties.
Fred Giggenbach, son of the late Kay Sweet and Fred Giggenbach, grew up in White Sulphur Springs and was educated in the Greenbrier County public school system. He is an Eagle Scout from Troop 51 in White Sulphur Springs. He is one of six Giggenbach siblings who grew up in the area. Giggenbach is a graduate of WVU with degrees in Political Science and Law. After graduating from college, he chose Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties to serve as a Volunteer In Service to America (AmeriCorps), serving low-income families in the Greenbrier Valley area with housing and other basic needs. He lived on subsistence wages while doing so. Following that one year domestic peace corps mission, Giggenbach trained in Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties as a certified United States Forest Service forest fire fighter. He battled western blazes for the WV Division of Forestry and the USFS in Idaho and Montana during the deadly fires of 1994 where 14 wild land firefighters died on Storm King Mountain in Colorado. Giggenbach still volunteers for the USFS with refuse pick up serving the Monongahela National Forest in Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties. He is also a member of the Greenbrier River Watershed Association.
Returning to Greenbrier County safely from fighting forest fires, Giggenbach worked for a year with the Family Refuge Center in Lewisburg in the domestic violence shelter as a child advocate for homeless children, also serving Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties.
After graduating from WVU Law School in 1999, and interning at the Greenbrier County Prosecutor’s Office, Giggenbach immediately began serving as a Greenbrier County Assistant Prosecutor, where he held that position for four years until becoming a statewide special prosecutor combating drugs, violent crime and elder abuse. For the last 11 years, Giggenbach has been a Senior Assistant Prosecutor for Kanawha County, where he has specialized in extensive courtroom trial work in all phases of criminal prosecution. Giggenbach was nationally featured in a television series for his successful prosecution and conviction of a Charleston shoe salesman who strangled and dismembered a co-worker and buried her in his back yard. He is also the special prosecutor for the Mingo County sheriff murder case.
Giggenbach maintains a home in White Sulphur Springs and co-owns and manages two rental businesses in the Greenbrier Valley area. He also maintains an office in downtown White Sulphur Springs. Giggenbach is married to Jennifer Clay Giggenbach, a registered nurse from Boone County. They currently reside in Charleston but they look forward to returning home to the Greenbrier Valley.
West Virginia law allows Giggenbach to run for judicial office in Greenbrier and Pocahontas Counties so long as he resides there upon taking office.