In the Matter of the Honorable Robert W. Freese, Judge of the Hendricks Superior Court 1

We find that Respondent, the Honorable Robert W. Freese, Judge of the Hendricks Superior Court 1, engaged in judicial misconduct by appointing an unqualified friend as trustee of a trust and personal representative of a related estate, failing to disclose the friendship or a financial relationship with the friend, and failing to act promptly when faced with mounting evidence of the friend's mismanagement and embezzlement of the funds entrusted to him.

The matter is before us on the Indiana Commission on Judicial Qualifications' ("Commission's") "Notice of the Institution of Formal Proceedings…