Magistrate Neary was appointed to serve Johnson County in 2022. Prior to that he served Muscatine County as a Magistrate since 2017. He earned his B.A. in finance from the University of Iowa in 1985 and then graduated from the University of Iowa with his Juris Doctorate in 1988. He was in private practice right out of college before he became an assistant city attorney for Sioux City in 1989. Magistrate Neary also worked for the public defender’s office in Sioux City before he became the director of Muscatine Legal Services in 1993. He has practiced in Indiana and Illinois before he came back to Iowa in 2001 where he maintained a sole proprietorship in Muscatine and Iowa City.
Magistrate Neary is a member of the Johnson County Bar Association: The American Bar Association; The Iowa State Bar Association; the Muscatine County Bar Association; and the Iowa Magistrate’s Association.