John Starr Neely, Jr., ’85, was eighty-six when he
passed on May 22, 2019. John attended Duke University
undergraduate and Law School after winning
the prestigious Angier Duke Scholarship. While in law
school, he married Janet Griffin. After graduation, they
moved to Ft. Lauderdale. John served two terms on the
Florida Bar Board of Governors and as President of the
International Academy of Trial Lawyers. After retiring
from the practice of law, he attended the Harvard Kennedy
School of Law where he received his Executive
Certificate in Mediation. John was survived by his three
children, six grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
C. Stanley Nelson, ’78, passed away May 31, 2021
shortly after his ninety-sixth birthday. C. Stanley graduated
from the University of Kansas, interrupting his
education after the first year to join the U.S. Marine
Corps in 1943. He spent three years in the Pacific and
returned to KU to finish his undergraduate degree and
get his law degree. C. Stanley married Rosemary Gaines
in 1949. In 1950 they moved to Salina where he spent
over sixty years practicing law. C. Stanley was preceeded
in death by Rosemary and survived by four sons and
four grandchildren.
Hon. Donald J. O’Brien, Jr., ’80, was eighty-one
when he passed on March 13, 2020. Judge O’Brien was
a Circuit Court Judge in Cook County, as was his father
and his son. And if that were not enough judges in
one family, Judge O’Brien’s life partner, Hon. Denise
O’Malley, was an Appellate Justice until her retirement
in 2009. When you had a case before Judge O’Brien,
you didn’t need to worry about getting breaks; a heavy
smoker, Judge O’Brien frequently needed his own
breaks to light up. But he was a fair and efficient jurist
who gave good trials. Judge O’Brien was survived by
Judge O’Malley, three children and four grandchildren.
Dennis E. W. O’Connor Sr., ’79, passed away on April
12, 2018 at the age of eighty-eight. O’Connor graduated
from the Naval Academy in 1952 and the George
Washington University School of Law in 1961. He was
a retired Captain in the U.S. Naval Reserve, qualified
to command submarines and destroyers. He served as a
Hawaii State Representative and Senator, a Councilman
for the Honolulu City Council, and was a past Chair of
the Democratic Party for the State of Hawaii. He was a
past State Chair for the College. Captain O’Connor is
survived by his wife of sixty years, Mary Elizabeth, four
children, six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Roberts B. Owen, ’83, who served as the State Department’s
legal adviser during the Iran hostage crisis and
played a crucial role as a negotiator and arbitrator at the
end of the Bosnian war, determining the future of one of
Bosnia’s most strategically important regions, died March
10, 2016, at his home. He was ninety. Bob was named the
State Department’s legal adviser — its chief legal officer
and the head of a 120-person legal team — in late 1979,
just a few weeks before a group of Iranian students seized
the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking more than sixty Americans
hostage. The diplomatic and economic maneuvering
finally succeeded, and the hostages were released in January
1981. Bob returned to private practice but was asked
back to the State Department in 1995 to serve as a senior
adviser on Bosnia, where a civil war was raging among
the nation’s Croat, Serb and Muslim populations. The
Dayton accords brought the war to an end in late 1995,
but Mr. Owen remained involved in Bosnia for another
four years as presiding arbitrator of a special International
Court of Justice tribunal. Shortly after graduating from
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