Who

The meanest grandmother you never had, Judge Judy has earned hundreds of millions of dollars dispensing fake courtroom advice on her syndicated TV show.

Backstory

Sheindlin spent more than a decade on the bench before she became known to the world as "Judge Judy." The daughter of a dentist, Sheindlin attended American University and earned a law degree at New York Law School (not to be confused with NYU Law), later signing on as a family court prosecutor. Her brassy persona soon attracted the attention of higher-ups, and in 1982 Ed Koch appointed her to the bench where she developed a reputation for her no-nonsense attitude and stinging courtroom one-liners. A 60 Minutes profile in the mid-1990s caught the attention of television execs, and she stepped down as a judge in 1996 to pursue a TV career.

Of note

Although she wasn't the first judge to go from a real courtroom to one constructed on a TV soundstage (that honor would go to Judge Joseph Wapner of People's Court fame), Sheindlin's shtick breathed new life into the format in the 1990s, and has since inspired a spate of knockoffs including Judge Joe Brown, Judge Mathis, and Judge Mills Lane. Now the highest-rated court show on television (her ratings occasionally even surpass Oprah when the two shows are scheduled head-to-head), Judge Judy will be around for a while. Per a contract Sheindlin signed in 2005, she'll continue to upbraid and humiliate trashy plaintiffs and defendants at least through the 2009-2010 season.

By the numbers

Sheindlin says that before she made it to TV, she was planning to retire on a civil servant's pension of around $40,000 a year. Her actual retirement is going to be a lot cushier: In 2007, Forbes reported that she had a net worth close to $100 million, making her the 13th-richest woman in entertainment. She earns upwards of $30 a million a year, the vast majority of it through syndication deals.

In print

Judy published a dry recitation of her philosophy of jurisprudence, Don't Pee on My Leg and Tell Me It's Raining!, in 1997. Her subsequent legal treatises have included Beauty Fades, Dumb is Forever and Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Personal

Judy—whose outsized personality hardly matches her petite physique (she's 5'1")—has been married three times, including twice to Judge Jerry Sheindlin, the host of The People's Court from 1999 to 2001, with whom she has five children. Sheindlin lives in a manse in Greenwich ("it has more than ten bedrooms"), and owns several other properties in New York, California, and Florida.

Toys

The Sheindlins occasionally go out on their yacht, appropriately named "Her Honor." Interested sailors can book a cruise for $135,000 per week at Herhonor.net.