Freda L. Wolfson

Born in Vineland, New Jersey,[1] Wolfson graduated from Douglass College in Rutgers University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1976 and later from Rutgers Law School in Newark with a Juris Doctor in 1979. A daughter of Holocaust survivors, she credited the experiences of her parents as leading her to pursue a career in law.[2]

Following law school graduation, Wolfson worked in private practice in New Jersey from 1979 – 1986 at the firms Lowenstein, Sandler, Kohl, Fisher & Boylan and Clapp & Eisenberg.

Wolfson began her federal judicial career as a United States Magistrate Judge of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. Wolfson was appointed to an eight-year term in 1986 and was re-appointed again in 1994 before serving another full eight-year term before her nomination as a United States District Judge in 2002.

Wolfson was nominated to the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey by President George W. Bush on August 1, 2002 to a seat vacated by Nicholas H. Politan. Wolfson was confirmed by the Senate on November 14, 2002 on a Senate vote and received her commission on December 4, 2002. She became Chief Judge on May 16, 2019, after the retirement of Jose L. Linares.

Wolfson has been honored as an American Bar Foundation Fellow and has received a New Jersey State Bar Association Young Lawyer Division's Professional Achievement Award. In 2002 she accepted the Outstanding Alumnus Award from the Alumni Association of the Rutgers School of Law, Newark. Recently, Judge Wolfson received the 2008 Women's Initiative & Leaders in Law Platinum Award from the New Jersey Women Lawyers Association.

• Freda L. Wolfson at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.