Epilogue

Chicago attorney Francis Daniel Morrissey, a retired partner in Baker & McKenzie and distinguished visiting professor at The John Marshall Law School, died Oct. 11 at age 77 of metastatic melanoma in the Northwestern Memorial Hospital palliative care center.

A past president of the Appellate Lawyers Association, Mr. Morrissey also had been president of the Illinois Board of Bar Examiners and the National Conference of Bar Examiners.

A 1958 graduate of the Loyola University School of Law, he joined Baker & McKenzie that year and became a partner in 1962. He was chair of the firm's national and international management committees.

Leaving the firm in 1995, Mr. Morrissey joined the John Marshall faculty and formed a group of Morrissey Scholars to discuss legal ethics and write articles on the subject. He also became pro bono counsel to the Chicago Catholic Archdiocese Office of Legal Services.

One of his initiatives while a leader of the bar examiners was to create a separate examination on legal ethics for prospective lawyers. The proposal has been adopted in 46 states.

Survivors include his wife, Catherine Seither Morrissey, director of the academic achievement program at John Marshall, and a son, Francis Peter Morrissey of Burke, Mahoney & Wise, Chicago.

Retired appellate justice John J. “Joe” Sullivan, who wrote more than 1,300 opinions in 15 years, died Oct. 2 at age 94 of pneumonia after a stroke in Sarasota, Fla., where he had moved in 1994.

He was a past president of the Chicago Bar Association, Illinois Trial Lawyers Association and the DePaul University Alumni Association.

A 1937 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law, Mr. Sullivan was captain of the football team, class president and valedictorian as an undergraduate.

He was a Navy lieutenant commander during World War II and served with Richard Nixon in the South Pacific Combat Air Transport Command. They flipped a coin to see who would lead the invasion of a Japanese-held island, and Mr. Sullivan won.

The invasion was called off, but he later received the Bronze Star for action on Bouganville during a Japanese attack.

In 1973, he accepted Nixon's request to help assemble a defense team in Washington, D.C., for a few weeks after the administration was involved in the Watergate break-in.

Mr. Sullivan was appointed to the Appellate Court, 1st District, in 1973 and was elected in 1974. He left the bench in 1988 at age 75 due to the age restriction. He was presiding justice of the Fifth Division for six years.

He was Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and the International Academy of Trial Lawyers.

Mr. Sullivan received an award of merit from the Cook County Bar Association for helping to gain the release of 400 blacks who were jailed after riots that followed the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968.

Joliet attorney George Edward Sangmeister, a former state legislator and member of Congress, died Oct. 7 at age 76 of leukemia in Silver Cross Hospital. He had survived a battle with cancer in 1977.

A 1960 graduate of The John Marshall Law School who served in the Army during the Korean War, Mr. Sangmeister was elected a justice of the peace in 1961 and later was a magistrate of the Will County Court. He was elected Will County state's attorney in 1965.

He served in the Illinois House from 1972 to 1976 and in the Senate from 1976 until 1987 He was elected in 1988 to the first of four terms in the U.S. House of Representatives.

While in Congress, Mr. Sangmeister initiated redevelopment of the Joliet Arsenal into the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery and the Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie. He served on the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs and brought a VA clinic to Joliet.

Since 1995, he had been a partner in McKeown, Fitzgerald, Zollner, Buck, Hutchison & Ruttle, and was of counsel in the Frankfort office.

Retired Chicago attorney David Park Currie, who taught at the University of Chicago Law School for 45 years, died Oct. 15 at age 71 of pneumonia in the University of Chicago Hospitals.

A graduate of Harvard Law School, Mr. Currie was a clerk for Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter until he joined the Chicago law faculty in 1962 and was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1963.

The Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law, he wrote two volumes of “The Constitution in the Supreme Court” and three volumes of “The Constitution in Congress.”

President of the Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company from 1981 to 1994, Mr. Currie played lead roles in 13 productions and directed 20 others during a 39-year span.

Survivors include his wife, State Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie.

Retired corporate attorney and executive Kenneth Jay Douglas, a River Forest resident, died Oct. 10 at age 85 of pneumonia in LaGrange Memorial Hospital. He also had Alzheimer's disease.

First in his 1950 graduating class at the Chicago-Kent College of Law, Mr. Douglas was a Navy radio operator during World War II.

He served in the Federal Bureau of Investigation in California for four years before returning to Chicago as vice president of industrial relations for Dean Foods and later vice president of finance.

Mr. Douglas was board chair at Dean Foods from 1970 to 1987 and vice chair until 1992. He also chaired the boards of the West Suburban Medical Center and the Economic Club of Chicago, and served on several others.

Rock Island attorney Robert Lucien Ellison, senior law clerk to Illinois Supreme Court Justice Thomas L. Kilbride since 2000, died Aug. 24 at age 70 in his home.

A 1962 graduate of The John Marshall Law School, Mr. Ellison was an assistant Rock Island County state's attorney until he joined Moran, Klockau, McCarthy, Schubert & Lousberg in 1965.

He was of counsel to McCarthy, Callas, Fuhr & Ellison when he left to join Justice Kilbride's staff. A former Rock Island Township auditor and attorney, he served on the County Sheriff's Merit Commission for 32 years.

Chicago attorney John Michael Fitzgerald, business manager and financial secretary of Local 134 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers from 1995 to 2006, died Oct. 13 at age 57 of liver disease in his home.

Mr. Fitzgerald enrolled in the union apprenticeship program while he studied law at night at the DePaul University College of Law. He graduated in 1980 and practiced labor law. He became special assistant to the IBEW local's business manager in 1991.

A recipient of a John E. Rooney Corp-orate Hero Award for his service on the board of the Chicago Children's Advocacy Center, Mr. Fitzgerald also received a Rerum Novarum Award from the Archdiocese of Chicago.

He served on the Zoning Reform Commission and Illinois Medical District Com-mission and several civic and municipal boards.

Retired Chicago attorney John M. Hartigan, former managing partner of Carroll, Hartigan & Cerney, died Oct. 22 at age 75 of diabetes in Evanston Hospital. He was a Kenilworth resident.

The son of former Cook County judge Matthew D. Hartigan, John Hartigan was a 1958 graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law. He was an Air Force first lieutenant and judge advocate general before joining Carroll & Brown.

Mr. Hartigan studied painting at The Art Institute of Chicago and was a trustee of Steppenwolf Theatre for 10 years. He was a cousin of former Illinois attorney general Neil Hartigan.

Retired Ottawa attorney Harold Robert Langer died Sept. 7 at age 77 in St. Francis Medical Center, Peoria. A 1957 graduate of the Drake University Law School who was admitted to the Illinois bar in 1960, he was the son and former law partner of Harold R. Langer.

H. Robert Langer served in the Army Infantry in the early 1950s and was a first lieutenant in the army of occupation in Germany.

After his father's death in 1976, Mr. Langer practiced with Stephen J. West until 1979, when he formed his own firm. He was attorney for the Ottawa elementary school district for 21 years and also represented the Marseilles and Seneca Rural Fire Protection Districts.

He also was a special assistant attorney general, Ottawa Township attorney and counsel to the Marseilles Building and Loan Association for many years.

Mr. Langer was a past president of the Ottawa Rotary Club and a board member of the Chamber of Commerce, United Fund, Camp Fire Girls and Starved Rock Council of Boy Scouts of America.

Retired Springfield attorney Robert Maurice Magill died Oct. 26 at age 90 in his home. A 1946 graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law, he had served in the Navy during World War II as a lieutenant commander aboard the USS Missouri and participated in the Japanese surrender.

Mr. Magill practiced with Rhoades, Magill, Magill & Ray for several years and later was a partner in Brown, Hay & Stephens. He was a past president of the Sangamon County Bar Association and the Downtown Kiwanis Club.

He was recognized as a Pillar of the Bar in September by the Illinois Bar Foundation and Sangamon County Bar.

Survivors include a son, James L. Magill, a former law partner who now is an assistant U.S. trustee in Peoria for the Central and Southern Districts.

Retired judge Jackson P. Newlin of Peoria died Oct. 1 at age 89 at Lutheran Hillside Village. A 1942 graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law, he served in the Coast Guard during World War II as a landing boat navigator in the South Pacific.

Mr. Newlin was of counsel to Bartley, Fraser, Parkhurst, Hession & Renner when he was appointed an associate judge in 1983. He retired in 1993.

A past president of the Kiwanis Club, Mr. Newlin served two terms as president of the District 150 school board. He was involved for more than 30 years with the Peoria Curcillo and prison ministry.

Survivors include a son, Timothy J. Newlin of Hinshaw & Culbertson, Peoria.

Cook County Associate Judge James J. Ryan died Nov. 3 at age 56 in Advocate Christ Medical Center, Oak Lawn, where he had been on a respirator since a heart attack a week earlier.

The son of former judge Daniel J. Ryan, James Ryan was a 1976 graduate of the DePaul University College of Law. He was an assistant corporation counsel until he was appointed to the bench in 1991. He had served in the 5th Municipal District in Bridgeview for more than 10 years.

Highland Park attorney Leonard Rubin died Oct. 15 at age 86 of cancer in the North Chicago Veterans Affairs Medical Center. He was a 1953 graduate of The John Marshall Law School.

Mr. Rubin served in the Army Ranger Battalion that scaled the cliffs of Pointe du Hoc on D-Day in 1944. He was wounded while saving a comrade and was captured by the Germans.

He escaped from a prison camp in France but was recaptured and sent to a camp near Berlin that was liberated by Russian troops.

Retired Chicago attorney William Kenneth Stevens, the brother of U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, died Oct. 28 at age 90 at King-Bruwaert House in Burr Ridge, where he had been treated for kidney problems.

A 1948 graduate of Harvard Law School, Mr. Stevens had a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Chicago. He was a Navy pilot during World War II.

A vice president in the trust department of First National Bank from 1948 to 1974, Mr. Stevens was the author of the 1968 text, “Illinois Estate Administration.”

He joined McDermott, Will & Emery in 1975 and retired in 1985. He later practiced in Naples, Fla., with the firm that became part of Fowler Whire Boggs Banker.

Retired 3rd Circuit judge and Edwardsville attorney Doane Kent “Duffer” Trone, a resident of Troy, died Oct. 25 at age 73 in Barnes-Jewish Hospital, St. Louis.

A 1960 graduate of the University of Illinois College of Law, Mr. Trone practiced in Madison County for 37 years, except for service as an associate judge from 1971 to 1975. He also was attorney for the villages of Livingston and Marine and their sanitary districts.

He was a government appeal agent for the local draft board, a special assistant attorney general and a member of the Glen Carbon board of trustees.

Mr. Trone was the son of Doane G. Trone and the brother of Robert E. Lee Trone, both deceased attorneys.

Retired jurist Lloyd A. VanDeusen of Waukegan died Nov. 1 at age 90 at Manor Care in Northbrook. A 1948 graduate of the Northwestern University School of Law, he was a past president of the Lake County Bar Association, the Waukegan High School Board and Victory Memorial Hospital.

Mr. VanDeusen practiced with Hall, Meyer, Fisher, VanDeusen, Holmberg & Snook, and he was a judge of the 19th Circuit and an appellate justice.