Former Chief Judge Frank McGarr
Biography
Judge McGarr graduated cum laude from Loyola in 1942 with a B.A. in philosophy. He went on to serve for three years as a U.S. Navy officer on a destroyer in the Pacific Fleet during World War II. Upon returning home, he returned to Loyola to teach English and law, subsequently served as administrative assistant to Loyola.s president until 1952, and earn his J.D. from the Law School.
In 1954, he began a three-year stint teaching at the Loyola University Law School. That same year, he joined the U.S. Attorney.s Office, where he served as chief of the Criminal Division, first assistant U.S. Attorney and first assistant Illinois attorney general until his appointment in 1970 as judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. He became the court.s chief judge in 1981, and served as its senior judge from 1986 until 1988.
In 2000 Judge McGarr was named chairman of the 14-member Governor.s Commission on Capital Punishment to examine the administration of the death penalty in Illinois. McGarr has served as vice president of the Chicago Crime Commission, president of the Chicago chapter of the Federal Bar Association, and has been appointed special master by the U.S. Supreme Court to adjudicate a boundary dispute between Arizona and California.
McGarr is a member of the Federal Bar Association, Chicago Bar Association and the Society of Trial Lawyers. He has been awarded the Loyola Law Alumni Medal of Excellence, Columbus-Cuneo-Cabrini Medical Center . Mother Cabrini Award, St. Ignatius College Preparatory School.s Dei Gloriam Award and the Catholic Lawyers Guild of Chicago.s Man of the Year Award.
