John Jerome "Jerry" Frese

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John Jerome "Jerry" Frese

March 8, 1935 – September 13, 2026

The Honorable John Jerome Frese, who served the St. Joseph Superior Court for thirty years and was known to nearly everyone as Jerry, passed peacefully from this life on September 13, 2026, at Holy Cross Village in South Bend, Indiana. He was 91.

He was born John Jerome Milton Paul Frese in Baltimore, Maryland, on March 8, 1935, to Joseph F. Frese and Mary Flynn Frese. He attended Calvert Hall College High School and Loyola University in Baltimore. He was considering the priesthood when he met Dolores Mary Warwick, a student at Seton High School who was considering the convent. Their love prevailed. They married on September 6, 1958.

Their honeymoon was a cross-country drive from Baltimore to Iowa City, with one night’s lodging at the Little Sisters of the Poor convent in Chicago. They had enrolled together at the University of Iowa — she in the Writers’ Workshop, he in the English Department — in pursuit of a shared ambition to spend their lives teaching literature. Their first son, Paul, was born in Iowa City in 1959. Their second, Sean, was born in Dublin in 1960, while Jerry was earning his master’s degree in the Romantic poets at Trinity College.

In 1964 Jerry accepted a professorship at the University of Chicago. He was recognized there not only for his Brilliance in English literature but for his incredible insight in administration, negotiation, and, Most of all, human Nature. He was promoted in short order to Assistant to the Provost and then Assistant to the President, serving Edward Levi, who remained a lifelong friend. Their third son, Matthew, was born in 1968, at the height of the protests in Chicago.

It was in those years, serving as a bridge between the university’s administration and the students protesting it — the Students for a Democratic Society among them — that Jerry made the decision that shaped the rest of his life. He left his position, finished his doctoral work, and turned to the law.

The family moved to North Liberty, Iowa, where he and Dolores both completed their Ph.D.s and he enrolled in law school. Dolores was then offered a professorship at Notre Dame, which had only recently gone co-ed. Jerry transferred to Notre Dame Law School, and South Bend became the family home for more than forty years.

He served as an Assistant United States Attorney in South Bend and Chicago, where some came to know him as “the merciful prosecutor.” In 1985 he took the bench of the St. Joseph Superior Court, where he sat until his retirement in 2015. Among lawyers he was known for the quality of his legal mind. Among those who came before him, he was known for mercy.

Dolores preceded him in 2024, after sixty-five years of marriage.

He is survived by his sons, Paul (Lisa) Frese, Sean (Jamie) Frese, and Matthew (Dawn) Frese; his brother, Jim Frese, of Chincoteague, Virginia; his sister-in-law, Ginny Lacey (Dale); his brother-in-law, John Charles Warwick; and many nieces and nephews who loved him. He was preceded in death by his parents; his brother, Joseph Albert Frese; and his sister, Judy Frese Johnson.

A visitation will be held on Sunday, September 20, 2026 from 3:00 pm until 6:00 pm at the Kaniewski Funeral Home, 3545 N. Bendix Dr. South Bend, IN. A rosary will be prayed at 6:00 pm in the funeral home. A Mass of Christian Burial will take place at 2:30 pm on Monday, September 21, 2026 at the Basilica of The Sacred Heart, Notre Dame, IN. Burial will follow at Cedar Grove Cemetery.

The family wishes to thank the South Bend community, the University of Notre Dame, and Holy Cross Village for the warmth of the home they gave Jerry, Dolores, and their sons. He leaves more lifelong friends and colleagues than can be named here.

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