Schroeck, who  teaches the Transnational Environmental Law Clinic — a partnership between Wayne Law and the University of Windsor Law School and the first of its kind in North America —and also is executive director of the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center, is one of the featured speakers for the boat tour.

The trip will take place aboard the Macassa Bay cruise ship, which will leave the dock next to the performance stage at Windsor Riverfront Plaza at noon, rain or shine, and return at 4 p.m. The cost of the tour is $30, which includes lunch.

 Another featured speaker will be John Hartig, manager of the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge and author of the award-winning book “Burning Rivers: Revival of Four Urban-Industrial Rivers that Caught on Fire.”

Other speakers will be Phil Roberts of the Essex County Field Naturalists Club and a representative of the Canadian Environmental Law Association. Peter Werbe, host of talk show “Nightcall” on WRIF-FM radio and a morning interview radio program on WCSX-FM and WMGC-FM, will serve as master of ceremonies.

The experts will point out some of the Detroit River’s environmental hot spots and its unique fish and wildlife habitats.

“This is an excellent opportunity to see why we must continue to value this special river and do what we can to protect it,” Schroeck said.

Tickets can be purchased online, or by contacting the CEA at ceaadmin@cogeco.net or 519-973-1116.

Also on hand for comment will be the attorneys for April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse of Hazel Park, a lesbian couple hoping to overturn the state of Michigan’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage.  The couple, both nurses who work in Detroit, also may be at the briefing. The women seek the right to marry legally so they can have joint custody of their three adopted children, and the SCOTUS decision could have a major impact on their case.

“Michigan law allows a single person to adopt, but not an unmarried couple, so these children are limited to one parent,” Sedler said. “Two wonderful lawyers, Dana Nessel, a 1994 Wayne Law graduate, and Carole Stanyar, undertook to represent April and Jayne without a fee in a federal court suit challenging the ban on adoption by an unmarried couple. I have been consulting with them at length, joined by Kenneth Mogill, an adjunct professor at the Law School.”

The DeBoer case is in U.S. District Court before Judge Bernard Freidman, who suggested early in the proceedings that the women expand their case to challenge the same-sex marriage ban. 

“We amended the complaint to do so,” Sedler said.

Friedman heard arguments in the case in March at the Law School —an event that drew dozens of reporters — and delayed decision until the Supreme Court decides its same-sex marriage cases.

Sedler said that he is always reluctant to speculate on the outcome of Supreme Court cases, and that in any event, it is unnecessary, because the court will issue its ruling soon enough. He said there are three possible outcomes.

* If the Supreme Court merely affirms or reverses the two same-sex cases before it, “the outcome would not control the result in the DeBoer case, but, depending on the rationale of the decisions, they might provide guidance for the Michigan case.”

*It is also possible, but less likely, that the court would render a sweeping decision, holding that the Constitution protects the right to same-sex marriage and thus rendering unconstitutional bans on same sex marriage that exist in Michigan and many other states.

*The least likely result, said Sedler, is that the court would reject the constitutional claim in its entirety and deny any constitutional protection to same-sex marriage.

To reach Sedler for comment, contact Brianna Fritz at Brianna.fritz@wayne.edu or 1-313-577-2733.

Photo caption:

Photo caption: Plaintiffs April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse (at right) are rushed by journalists as they leave Partrich Auditorium at Wayne State University Law School, where arguments on their case were heard by U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman in March. Photo by Millard Berry.

The Supreme Court ruled June 13 in a unanimous decision that human genes can’t be patented, even when a company has spent millions on research to isolate those genes.

Wayne State University Law School Associate Professor Lance Gable, a public health attorney who specializes in bioethics, is available to comment on the decision and on the issues involved in the Supreme Court case of Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics.

The decision is being considered a victory for cancer patients, but Myriad Genetics officials also seem to consider the court’s “compromise” ruling as a victory, and the company’s stock value is up.

The court said a company cannot have a patent on the use and study of human genes — in this case BRACA1 and BRACA2,  genes identified and isolated by Myriad that are used to test for susceptibility to hereditary ovarian and breast cancer. Myriad held the patent for 15 years before it was challenged in the lawsuit.

But the court also said that the company deserved credit for its research, and might be eligible for a patent on a synthetic form of the genes.

Gable has been a Wayne Law faculty member since 2006, and also is a scholar with the Centers for Law and Public’s Health: A Collaborative at Georgetown and Johns Hopkins Universities, which is affiliated with the Word Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Gable received a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and a M.P.H. from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He also received a B.A. in political science and biology from Johns Hopkins University. Gable’s research addresses the overlap between law, policy, ethics, health and science. He has published journal articles on a diverse array of topics including public health law, ethics, and policy; research ethics; and information privacy.

Snowden left his job, traveled to Hong Kong, and then revealed himself publicly over the weekend as the source of the leaks about the government’s controversial data collection program.  Meanwhile, national debate rages on about the ethics of the government having access to everyone’s phone and Internet records, and about what will happen to Snowden.

Dubinsky is available to talk to reporters with questions regarding the situation.

“The interesting question is whether the government’s pursuit of individuals accused of national security crimes should be wholly different, in terms of extradition, than its pursuit of those accused of drug crimes, violent crimes and human rights atrocities,” Dubinsky said. “Does the U.S. government need to renegotiate some of our bilateral extradition treaties which were not written with national security crimes in mind? Would the matter be different if the leaker were not a U.S. citizen? What do we do when a scientist from Iran privy to nuclear secrets seeks to defect to the United States?”

Dubinsky teaches national security law, among other courses, at Wayne Law. He came to the Law School in 2005, after teaching at Yale Law School and Georgetown University Law Center. He has served as associate director of the Allard K. Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic and associate director of the Orville H. Schell Jr. Center for International Human Rights, and as a member of the U.S. delegation to the Hague Conference on Private International Law. Before his career as a scholar, he was an associate with Wilmer Cutler & Pickering.

Dubinsky is a graduate of Yale College, Harvard Law School and the Universiteit Katholieke of Leuven, Belgium.  He often gives presentations on national security legal issues.

To interview Dubinsky, contact Brianna Fritz at Brianna.fritz@wayne.edu or 313-577-2733.

A growing number of students from China are expected to study at Wayne State University Law School in 2014 — a result of the school’s decision to offer a master’s degree in U.S. law and its vigorous outreach efforts to promote it.

Wayne Law Dean Jocelyn Benson just returned from a “very productive” five-day visit to several law schools in China including the China University of Political Science and Law (CUPL), which has forged a partnership with Wayne Law that likely will include an exchange of professors as well as new law students coming to Detroit to study American law.  Benson described her meetings as “very successful” and said she plans to return in the spring for another visit that will include student recruitment for the 2014 fall semester.

“Wayne’s new master’s degree program in U.S. law is designed for outstanding law students from other countries,” Benson said.  “This will be an attractive program for students who seek to practice law in the United States, transnational law in their home countries, who may work in government ministries involved in negotiations with the United States, or who intend to work on advanced degrees and careers as scholars.”

In addition to her visit to CUPL, a prestigious law school with two campuses in Beijing, Benson met with officials from:

• Beijing Foreign Studies University Law School that “agreed to encourage their students to apply to Wayne Law;”
• Northwest University of Politics and Law in Xi’an to discuss a possible partnership with Wayne Law;
•  Tsinghua University Law School in Beijing where Benson, who is an expert on U.S. election law, spoke to a group of students and professors about Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and the 2009 Supreme Court decision on election campaign funding and First Amendment rights in that case;
• Central University of Finance and Economics in Beijing.

“I have since heard from Tsinghua students with whom I met that are interested in Wayne Law,” Benson said. “Their interest reinforces my belief that a partnership with Tsinghua, similar to what we are putting in place with CUPL, might be beneficial to Wayne Law in the long run.”

Photo caption:

Wayne State University Law School Dean Jocelyn Benson was walking in Beijing, and was surprised to come across this poster advertising her talk at Tsinghua University Law School in China.

The award goes to a law school that “has demonstrated the highest level of outreach to racially and ethnically diverse students …,” according to the LSAC website. The contest strongly considers creativity, event attendance and overall use of funds to choose honorees.

Winners were announced June 1. They are DePaul University College of Law in Chicago, first; University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, Calif., second; and Chapman University School of Law in Orange, Calif. Other schools in the top 10 were the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University in Tempe; Emory University School of Law in Atlanta, Ga.; Gonzaga University School of Law in Spokane, Wash.; Loyola University Chicago School of Law; Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee; and William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minn.

Wayne Law Dean Jocelyn Benson said she is proud of the Law School’s top 10 diversity outreach status with LSAC.

 “We will continue our strong efforts to encourage and celebrate diversity at Wayne Law, and value the variety of perspectives a diverse student body brings to the study of law,” she said. “Our students will go on to be powerful advocates for equal justice for all.”

The state average was 65 percent. Second after Wayne Law for first-time passage rates was the University of Michigan Law School, with a passage rate of 87 percent.

Wayne Law Dean Jocelyn Benson said she is encouraged by the high first-time passage rate, and is strongly committed to further improving the rate for all of the school’s graduates.  In her February State of the Law School address, she outlined her plans for helping students reach their full potential, and improving the school’s bar passage rate was among those goals.

In keeping with that plan, Judge and Adjunct Professor Elizabeth Gleicher is in the initial stages of developing a new course on Michigan law for the winter 2014 term, and Sarah Garrison has joined the Dean of Students Office to assist graduates taking the July bar exam. The Law School’s development team also is “exploring opportunities for donors to financially support bar prep courses for students with financial need,” the dean said.

Wayne Law’s passage rate for graduates taking the February bar exam for a second time was 50 percent, above the state average of 48 percent for second-time exam takers.

Wayne Law’s overall passage rate is 63 percent, which takes into account the second-time passage rate. The Law School’s overall rate is above the state average (58 percent), above Michigan State University’s average (60 percent), and second only to Michigan's (82 percent).  

Wayne Law Professor Nick Schroeck, who is executive director of the Great Lakes Environmental Law Center and 2007 alumnus, joined U.S. Rep. Gary Peters, a 1989 Wayne Law graduate, and others to speak out during a May 28 press conference on Fort Street, where the three-story-high pet coke mounds piled east and west of the Ambassador Bridge are clearly visible.

Schroeck is no stranger to media attention. He is frequently tapped by reporters, conservation groups and other law schools across the country as an expert on high-profile environmental law issues, including the controversy over oil and gas extraction by hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

The pet coke piles in Detroit raise a number of public health and environmental concerns. The dust that blows off the mounds is “pretty dramatic,” based on photos taken from the Canadian side of the river, Schroeck said. Also of concern is water runoff into the Detroit River from the uncovered stacks of pet coke, which are expected to be shipped to other countries. Pet coke can be burned with coal to produce energy, but the process is dirty, and U.S. EPA regulations prevent it from being used much in the United States.

Health studies and permitting processes — federal , state and local — for storing the pet coke seem to be lacking, Schroeck said during a flurry of recent interviews over the issue. And the issuance of government permits often include public hearings, which to date haven’t been held over the pet coke mounds, he said.

State officials with the Department of Environmental Quality told media that the piles of pet coke don’t pose a “significant” health risk. Schroeck isn’t convinced. Nor is Peters.

The Congressman said he will introduce a bill to have the EPA conduct environmental and health studies, and he cited Delaware regulations that require pet coke to be covered during storage and transport. Schroeck said that at the very least, the mountains of pet coke are detrimental to the area’s growing economy and recent efforts to enhance the riverfront for recreation, and he noted that the southwest Detroit neighborhood already is subjected to heavy pollution.

The Wayne Law professor recently was quoted and/or interviewed as an expert on the issue by Fox 2 TV, the Windsor Star, CBC Radio, the Detroit Free Press, MLive and Michigan Public Radio.

To schedule an interview with Schroeck, contact Brianna Fritz at Brianna.fritz@wayne.edu.

Photo caption: Wayne State University Law School Professor Nick Schroeck is interviewed by reporters as Congressman Gary Peters (left) looks on.

Ten years ago, friends of the late public interest attorney Mark Weiss, a 1969 alumnus of Wayne State University Law School, created a fundraiser to honor his legacy.

Today, that event — Mark Weiss Day at Comerica Park — is going strong. It raises money to provide scholarships for law students interested in public interest law and for recent Wayne Law graduates in the field to help retire their student debt. This year’s event is set for 5:30 p.m. July 26 at Comerica Park. The evening begins with a picnic on party deck No. 3 at the ballpark, followed by the game — Detroit Tigers vs. Philadelphia Phillies — at 7 p.m. The cost is $100 — $50 of which is a tax-deductible donation to the Mark Weiss Memorial Scholarship Fund.

For Michael Pitt, a “Super Lawyer” civil rights attorney, co-founder of Pitt McGehee Palmer Rivers & Golden, and a 1974 Wayne Law alumnus, the fundraiser is personal.

Pitt, along with Weiss’ friends and legal partners, Barry Waldman, Marjory Cohen, Kenneth Mogill and Jon Posner, founded the ballgame benefit and the scholarship it endows, a joint project of Wayne Law and the Michigan Association for Justice. To date, 29 scholarships have been awarded in memory of Weiss.

Pitt said he knew Weiss, who was a few years older, growing up in their Detroit neighborhood, and admired him.

“As I became a lawyer, I realized that he represented the kind of lawyer that I wanted to be,” Pitt said. “He was an inspiration to me. Mark devoted his considerable skills to fighting for the rights of the poor and powerless, and protecting the civil rights of all litigants. Mark was a former president of the Michigan Association for Justice, and one of the recognized leaders of the organization. The year the fundraiser was founded, I was headed to be president of the organization, so I wanted to not only recognize Mark, but also show leadership for MHA, to encourage members to become more open and charitable in their outlook toward the legal profession.”

A “core group” attends the ballpark benefit honoring Weiss each year — people who knew and admired him along with their family members.  It also is a good chance for networking and to serve a worthy cause, Pitt said.

“Anybody interested in helping students become interested in public interest law ought to attend this event,” he said. “At the picnic before the game, people are very open and willing to introduce themselves.”

And, he added, it’s a lot of fun.

If you cannot attend the game, but wish to make a contribution to the Mark Weiss Memorial Scholarship Fund, donations are accepted online or by mail.  If by mail, send your check directly to Wayne State University Law School: Mark Weiss Scholarship Fund, attention: Matt Cunningham at 471 West Palmer

Their placements around the globe are made possible by Wayne Law’s dynamic and expanding Program for International Legal Studies, which is offering more travel and real-life work experience than ever before.

Law student Zachary Rowley, a Bay City resident, will work this summer as an intern in the Office of the General Counsel at Tata Motors in Mumbai, India. Tata is the largest manufacturer of automobiles in India, and Rowley will work on legal issues arising from the firm’s supply chain and distribution network.

Rowley majored in economics and East Asian Studies at Kalamazoo College, and studied language and international business as an undergraduate for five months in Beijing, China. So he knows what it’s like to be suddenly immersed in a culture other than his own. He’s very excited to be going to India and to be gaining more experience in international law, he said.

“I plan on pursuing international business courses while at Wayne, and I think this will only help ground my studies in the real world,” Rowley said.  “Wayne has a great reputation for international law.”

An Eagle Scout, Rowley has traveled to many countries in addition to China, including the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands, Italy, Greece and Hong Kong. And now he’ll add India to that list.

Another law student entering the international business world is Nicholas Jones of Hopkins, who considers his pending internship with one of Mexico’s leading law firms —Barrera Siqueiros y Torres Landa in Mexico City — as “an amazing opportunity to experience not only everyday Mexican culture but also to experience the business and legal culture” there.

“I hope to spend a good amount of time working with the firm’s international arbitration group,” Jones said. “I also would like to get a chance to work on some conflict-of-laws issues that involve bringing American laws into the Mexican court system.”

Barrerra Siqueiros y Torres Landa has 24 different practice areas, and is regularly engaged in some of the most high profile foreign investment deals, international commercial arbitration and intellectual property transactions in Latin America. The firm and its partners are consistently ranked as global leaders by a variety of international publications.

Like Rowley, Jones is a graduate of Kalamazoo College, where he majored in biology and business, was quarterback of the school’s football team, and also attended classes in Madrid, Spain. He expects to graduate from Wayne Law in 2015, and hopes to practice international business law.

Steven Helton of Riverview and Zachary Van Horn of Traverse City will work as interns in the international arbitration group in London, England, for Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, a multinational law firm with offices around the world. The firm recently was named “International Arbitration Firm of the Year” by U.S. News magazine.

“I am very interested in pursuing a career in international arbitration, so this internship is an incredible opportunity for me,” Van Horn said.

He’ll be entering an LL.M. program in international commercial arbitration in London next fall, an opportunity he sought due to his enthusiasm for international law studies at Wayne.

Helton, too is excited about his opportunity to participate in international law work.

“I really look forward to working for Wilmer Hale because it's such a well-respected firm,” he said.  “I know that other people who have participated in this internship have gone on to do some very cool things, and I hope the same will be true for me.”

Gary Born, the head of Wilmer Hale’s international arbitration group, was the 2012 commencement speaker at Wayne Law, and was instrumental in creating the internships with the firm for Wayne students. Born is the author of “International Arbitration: Law and Practice” (Kluwer 2012) and “International Civil Litigation in United States Courts” (Aspen fifth edition 2011), both leading texts in the field. Born received the Global Arbitration Review’s “Advocate of the Year” award in 2010 and was chosen as the “World’s Best International Litigator” in a survey by Legal Media Group.

Wayne Law’s Program for International Legal Studies covers all travel and living expenses for each of these internships.

Four other Wayne Law students — Joshua Aprile of Marine City; Yunjoo Goze of Andong, Korea; Karinne Marcolini of Grosse Pointe; and Adam Taylor of Monroe — will be working abroad for human rights groups overseas this summer, and another — Eric Shovein, who grew up in Grosse Pointe Woods, will be studying in the Hague, Netherlands.

As recipient of the Freeman Fellowship, Shovein will attend the prestigious Hague Academy of International Law, the academic branch of the international Court of Justice, also known as the World Court. Each year, the Program for International Legal Studies at Wayne Law sends one student to the academy to be taught by some of the world’s foremost international lawyers in courses on either public or private international law.

Aprile will travel to Mexico City to work with Mexico Unido Contra la Delincuencia, an organization that assists both police and victims in response to the high level of criminal activity in certain parts of the country, and that seeks to strengthen the rule of law.

Goze is already in New Delhi, India, working with the Dalit Foundation, an organization dedicated to using the courts and social awareness to end discrimination against India’s Dalits, or “untouchables.” Dalits are subjected to pervasive forms of discrimination.

Marcolini will work in Nassau, Bahamas, with the Crisis Centre, an organization that helps victims of domestic violence, offering them legal assistance, and running public education campaigns to end spousal and child abuse and empower victims to leave their abusers.

Taylor will be working in Madurai, India, with People's Watch, a well-respected human rights organization that serves as a liaison to international monitoring bodies at the United Nations and elsewhere, and researches and reports on all aspects of Indian political and social practices.

Nine Wayne Law students will be traveling this summer to England, the Bahamas, the Netherlands, Mexico and three locations in India. They will advocate for human rights, intern at top international law firms, study with some of the world's leading international law scholars and much more.

Four students earned International Public Interest Law Fellowships, and will spend their summers living in developing countries engaged in advocacy on a broad range of human rights issues. Fellows receive a $5,000 stipend to cover travel and living expenses for up to two months of work.

IPILF recipient Joshua Aprile will work in Mexico City for Mexico Unido Contra la Delincuencia. The organization seeks to strengthen the rule of law in Mexico and assist both police and victims in responding to the high level of criminal activity in certain parts of the country.

“This is the first time we’ve placed an IPILF student in Latin America, and we are thrilled that a well-respected organization like MUCD has agreed to take our students as interns,” said Professor Gregory Fox, director of the Program for International Legal Studies.

Aprile, who grew up in Marine City, earned a bachelor’s degree magna cum laude in political science from Grand Valley State University, and expects to earn his law degree next year. He hopes to practice international litigation and arbitration after graduation. Wayne Law’s strong Program for International Legal Studies drew him to the school in the first place, he said.

“For me, this fellowship is an excellent opportunity to apply my legal education in a positive way that genuinely helps people, and to receive an amazing cultural experience that will stay with me for the rest of my life,” Aprile said.

IPILF recipient Yunjoo Goze, who is from Andong, Korea, is already in New Delhi, India, beginning her work with the Dalit Foundation, where other Wayne Law interns have worked in the past. The foundation works to end discrimination against Indian Dalits, often referred to as “untouchables.” The group suffers from pervasive forms of discrimination, which the foundation seeks to end by using the courts and efforts to raise social awareness of the problem.

“I just arrived a few days ago, and it has been pretty hectic,” Goze said via email. “I’d like to gain firsthand experience working with international human rights through the fellowship. I’ll be working for empowerment of Dalit communities in India. Dalits are the lowest rung of the caste system.”

She spent last summer working with Wayne Law’s Transnational Environmental Law Clinic. She hopes to work in the field of international environmental law after graduation next year.

Law student Adam Taylor, who calls Monroe his hometown, is another IPILF recipient. He’ll work with People's Watch in Madurai, India, where other fellowship winners have been placed in past years. People's Watch is one of the most respected human rights organizations in India, issuing reports on all aspects of Indian political and social practices, and serving as a liaison to international monitoring bodies at the United Nations and elsewhere

Taylor said he’ll be writing reports about human rights violations and also be “out in the field,” attending hearings and researching patterns of abuse.

“This fellowship will provide me with a hands-on, real world experience for how international law functions,” he said. “I will get to see how international law copes with humans and the multitude of issues and viewpoints that we bring to the table. It will allow me to further grow as a person by expanding my exposure to different cultures and philosophies.”

And it will give him experience he hopes to apply after graduation next year toward a career working overseas “in a field that helps people from different nations work together toward business, environmental or human rights goals,” he said.

Taylor holds a Michigan teaching certificate and a bachelor’s degree from Eastern Michigan University in social studies and history for secondary education. After graduation from EMU, he spent a year teaching English at a middle school in South Korea.

IPILF recipient Karinne Marcolini will work at the Crisis Centre in Nassau, Bahamas, another group that has hosted Wayne Law interns in the past. The Crisis Centre assists victims of domestic violence, a pervasive problem seldom noticed in a country dominated by the tourist trade. The center provides legal assistance to victims and runs public campaigns to delegitimize spousal and child abuse and to empower victims to leave their abusers.

“I will get a lot of exposure to the Bahamian court system, and I hope to do some writing and research for the Crisis Centre, as well,” Marcolini said. “This fellowship is an amazing opportunity and my first step toward a career in public interest law. I’m interested in environmental law, but I’m excited to see what other opportunities there are.”

Like Aprile, she said she chose Wayne Law because of the Program for International Legal Studies and the opportunities available to its students.

Marcolini, whose hometown is Grosse Pointe, expects to graduate from Wayne Law in 2015. She earned a bachelor’s degree in international relations, political theory and constitutional democracy from Michigan State University. She plans a career in public interest law in Detroit.

Several other Wayne law students will be going abroad via initiatives created by the Program of International Legal Studies.

 *Zachary Rowley of Bay City will work as an intern in the Office of the General Counsel at Tata Motors in Mumbai, India. Tata is the largest manufacturer of automobiles in India. Rowley will be working on legal issues arising from Tata’s supply chain and distribution network.

*Nicholas Jones of Hopkins will work as an intern at one of Mexico’s leading law firms — Barrera Siqueiros y Torres Landa in Mexico City. This is a first-time placement for Wayne Law. With 25 different practice areas, the firm is consistently ranked as a leader in the Latin American legal market.

*Eric Shovein, who grew up in Grosse Pointe Woods, as recipient of the Freeman Fellowship, will attend the prestigious Hague Academy of International Law in the Hague, Netherlands. The academy is the academic branch of the International Court of Justice, also known as the World Court. Each year Wayne Law sends one student to the academy, to be taught by the world’s leading international lawyers in courses on either public or private international law.

*Zachary Van Horn of Traverse City and Steven Helton of Riverview will spend several months in London, England, as interns in the international arbitration practice group of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr. The internship was made possible by Gary Born, a partner at Wilmer Hale and one of the world’s leading practitioners and scholars of international commercial arbitration. Born received an honorary degree and delivered the commencement address at Wayne Law in 2012. Fox and Wayne Law Professor Paul Dubinsky both worked for Wilmer Hale’s predecessor law firms earlier in their careers.

She’s the author of an award-winning and often-quoted blog called A Taxing Matter that makes money and tax issues easily understood, and also takes on American tax policies that “operate for the high and mighty,” in her words. The latest blog entry, “Fixing Sequestration (for the rich only),” tackles the Senate’s recent move to exempt air traffic controllers from the tax cuts that are impacting Head Start, indigent defense and many other federal programs.

Beale will assume the chair of the ABA’s Section of Taxation Committee on Standards of Tax Practice on July 1 for a two-year term. She previously served as vice-chair.  As chair, Beale will have a chance to “affect the development and administration of the tax laws” through the group’s programs and projects, according to Michael Hirschfeld, chair-elect of the ABA Section of Taxation.

The committee also is charged with providing education to the public about taxes and tax systems, a calling already undertaken daily by Beale, who teaches courses on Corporate Taxation, Partnership Taxation and Income Taxation. Her well-read blog also serves as an education tool.

She has a bachelor of science degree in chemistry magna cum laude from Duke University, a master’s and a Ph.D. in linguistics from Cornell University, a J.D. summa cum laude from Cornell Law School, and an LL.M. in taxation from New York University. Before her law school career, she was a tax law practitioner, a Congressional staffer, a Peace Corps volunteer and a university administrator.

Beale is the author of numerous publications on tax policy, and is co-author of “Corporate Taxation,” a textbook for students earning LL.M. degrees in taxation.

Wayne Law has a strong tradition of graduating attorneys with real-world practice skills as well as a firm grounding in legal theory. Advocacy at Wayne will further improve that tradition, and make possible an advanced skills course focusing on voir dire, expert witness testimony and the use of technology in the courtroom. In addition, Mann’s gift will allow the Law School to hire a distinguished trial court judge to direct and reshape the program.

Mann is a seasoned trial attorney who has earned “super lawyer” status every year since 2006. He is a managing partner with Bowman and Brooke LLP in its Detroit office, and practices in litigation areas including commercial and product liability defense. Mann has taken cases to verdict in state and federal courts of eight states.  He was special counselor on products liability to former Michigan Gov. James Blanchard, and a special master for a class action, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Michigan. In 2011, Michigan Lawyers Weekly named him a “Leader in the Law.” And until December 2008, he was a tenured associate professor at the Law School, where he taught courses in evidence, civil procedure, trial advocacy, torts and product liability.

So he knows full well the value of expanding STAP.

“Enhancing the presentation opportunities for students will captivate and empower many of them,” he said. “In turn, they will be able to provide all citizens, including under-represented groups, top-notch legal services. WSU must hold fast to its urban mission. My experience as a student at Wayne excited and empowered me, and allowed me to create a professional pathway that has provided great fulfillment. Providing Michigan students with a first-class opportunity to maximize potential as presenters and persuaders is likely to energize and empower others.”

His gift also will allow intensive “boot camps” for STAP students facilitated by the National Institute for Trial Advocacy, and will enhance the internal and external competitions that help students hone their courtroom skills.

As a professor, Mann got to know many students and enjoyed teaching them, as well as learning from them, he said.

“Teaching at its best is a reciprocal process,” he said. “You get out of it as much as you put into it. I truly loved it.”

His gift is a way of giving back to his alma mater, he said.

“In this way, I pay the debt I owe to WSU and to the state of Michigan,” Mann said.

He is confident that his gift will give students “an appreciation of the very hard work and thoughtfulness that underpins a successful, winning presentation, in any context,” and that those students, like him, will someday chose to give back, too.

Wayne State University Law School created the fellowships in 2009 to help students gain experience before graduation, and to help the nonprofit and government organizations where the students lend their efforts. PILF funds will be distributed as stipends to help students with their summer living expenses. Fellowship recipients are selected be a committee of Wayne Law faculty members, staff and alumni.

One alumnus played a key role in helping law student Kyle Peczynski gain his prestigious internship with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this summer.

Peczynski, a Livonia resident who just finished his second year of law school, found the post by researching Wayne Law alumni working in environmental law. He found Steven Chester, former head of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality and a 1981 alumnus who now is deputy assistant administrator with the EPA in Washington, D.C.

“I contacted him about possible internship opportunities in his office,” Peczynski said. “He was very receptive of my inquiry, and sent my resume to the person in charge of hiring in the D.C. office. That person then told me that he would like to interview me for a position in the summer clerk program. I think Mr. Chester must have been looking out for me as a fellow member of the Wayne Law community, because I was hired after a 15-minute phone interview. Lesson: Talking to people is everything, especially if you have something in common with them.”

Peczynski will spend the summer working in the EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, and he’s grateful that the PILF funds will make it possible without financial pain.

“My position this summer is unpaid, and it happens to be in one of the most expensive cities in the United States,” he said. “The PILF makes positions like mine feasible, and I hope that it continues to benefit students with a passion for public interest in the coming years.”

He plans to seek work in public interest environmental law after graduation.

“I am also interested in how the law will shape energy development and climate policy in the coming years,” Peczynski said.

He’ll be in exactly the right place this summer to explore that interest.

Wayne Law student Ana Stutler, a Detroit resident, won a PILF award last year and this year, as well. Last summer, Stutler worked with lawyers on the Sexual Assault Unit at the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office, which said was “a major learning experience,” she said. This summer, she’ll lend her talents to the Neighborhood Christian Legal Clinic in Indianapolis.

“First, I will be working in housing law, specifically focused on foreclosure prevention, landlord/tenant issues and housing consumer scams,” Stutler said. “Second, I will be working with the director of the organization in order to learn what it looks like on a very practical level to run a similar organization. The internship is a hugely significant step in my plans to pursue a career in public interest law after graduation, because it is training me in specifically what I hope to be doing — providing faith-based legal services to people in Detroit that are relevant to their needs.”

She also is working with her church, Mack Avenue Community Church, to start a legal aid clinic on Detroit’s east side.

With a year of law school to go, student Eric Shovein, who grew up in Grosse Pointe Woods, already has a wealth of experience in public interest work. He spent last summer in India, courtesy of a Wayne Law International Public Interest Law Fellowship, working as a legal intern with MASUM, a human rights and torture law organization. And before he started law school, he spent a year working with AmeriCorps programs in Michigan, and two months training with the Peace Corps in Cambodia.

This summer, as a PILF recipient, he’s off to San Francisco to work with the Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration, and he’s quite sure his experiences in India as well as his work with Wayne Law’s Asylum and Immigration Law Clinic will allow him to “better connect with ORAM clients and provide with the legal help they need to obtain their deserved refugee status in America.”

He’ll work from San Francisco with a specific ORAM client in South Africa “to make sure the proper refugee paperwork is completed in the proper manner,” Shovein said.

He’ll also be assisting ORAM with its research on LGBTI persecution in various countries, and “sending the research to the U.S. State Department and other organizations so that the legal community can better understand the struggles LGBTI people have abroad — and even here,” he said.

Shovein plans to work in refugee and asylum law after graduation.

“I want nothing more than to stay in human rights law, especially immigration, given the resilient, brilliant victims of torture who can only make our society stronger and more diverse when they obtain the liberty they very much deserve,” he said.

Assistant Professor Brandon Hofmeister directs the PILF program, which offers crucial work experience and networking opportunities for law students, as well as serving public interest, he said.

“Wayne State University Law School is a public, urban law school and is committed to broadly serving the public interest,” Hofmeister said. “The PILF program helps our outstanding students to give voice and legal expertise to people and causes that are often underserved by the legal community.”

2013 Public Interest Law Fellowship recipients:

Edyth Abraham, Windsor, Ontario — Wayne County Solutions Oriented Domestic Violence Prevention Court

Shahar Ben-Josef, Detroit — Council on American-Islamic Relations – Michigan Chapter

Judith Bohr, Detroit — American Friends Service Committee – Michigan Criminal Justice Program

Connor Brown, Detroit — Maurice & Jane Sugar Law Center for Economic & Social Justice

Jeremy Diamond, Livonia — Atlanta Legal Aid Society

Sarah Douglas-Siegel, Ann Arbor — State Appellate Defender Office

Carrie Floyd, Ann Arbor — Legal Services of South Central Michigan

Melissa Kliemann, Dearborn — Washtenaw County Public Defender

Steven Knox, Mount Clemens — Legal Advocacy for People with Cancer – WSU Law School Disability Clinic

Ben McCoy, Ann Arbor — Great Lakes Environmental Law Center

Nicholas McIntyre, Rochester Hills — U.S. Department of Justice Community Relations Service

Klaudia Nikolli, Grosse Pointe — Legal Aid and Defender Association Detroit

Kyle Peczynski, Livonia — U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

Eric Shovein, Detroit — Organization for Refuge, Asylum and Migration

Ana Stutler, Detroit — Neighborhood Christian Legal Clinic

Photo caption: Kyle Peczynski, Ana Stutler and Eric Shovein

“Pete Sagal (of NPR’s ‘Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me!’ fame) is the show’s host,” Hall said. “His field producer tracked me down because he had heard about the Asian carp issue and my involvement and commentary in the media. The producer met me in Michigan, and I gave him some background on the issue. A few months later, the crew invited me to travel with them to Peoria, Ill., to film the segment on the Illinois River with the Asian carp jumping all around — much better film footage than interviewing me in front of a bookshelf or something like that.”

So Hall, an expert on environmental and water law who speaks and publishes widely on related topics, including those surrounding Asian carp, set sail with a film crew aboard an Illinois Natural History Survey boat last fall on the Illinois River, where Asian carp have “taken over,” he said, and discussed the invasive fish — which can grow to 100 pounds and four feet long — amid a background of large, leaping carp.

The fish jump several feet into the air when motorboats vibrate the water, and in infested areas like the Illinois River, the carp endanger recreational boaters and also take over the ecosystem, gobbling all available food and starving out native fish species.

The episode featuring Hall, the fourth and final one in the “Constitution USA” series, will air at 9 p.m. May 28. It won’t be the first time Hall has been featured on PBS. He was interviewed by Jim Lehrer on PBS “Newshour” a few years ago about the infamous BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

“Constitution USA” features Sagal traveling across the country on a Harley exploring the meaning of the Constitution, historical events that have defined it and some of today’s major Constitutional debates.

One of those debates is hampering control of the carp infestation, which began in the South, where the fish were imported to clean catfish ponds and control weeds. Flooding of the ponds introduced them to the Mississippi River. The voracious fish made their way up the Mississippi over a span of 10 years, and now are on the brink of entering the Great Lakes via Chicago area waterways that connect to Lake Michigan.

“If the Asian carp get into the Great Lakes, it will be an ecological disaster caused by a failure of Constitutional federalism,” wrote Hall in his Great Lakes Law blog. “The states cannot solve this problem on their own. They need the federal government’s help to keep the Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes through the many connecting interstate waters. But so far, all three branches of the federal government aren’t doing the job.

“While politicians and legal scholars debate the role of federal versus state control in environmental protection, everyone agrees that the federal government must resolve disputes between states, protect interstate resources and uphold its duties under treaties with foreign governments. But with the Asian carp approaching the Great Lakes, all three branches of the federal government have failed miserably in upholding their Constitutional duties. The Supreme Court has refused to hear the dispute brought by the Great Lakes states. Legislation to solve the problem has gone nowhere in Congress. And President Obama has ignored our obligation to Canada under the Boundary Water Treaty and has punted the issue to the Army Corps and other bureaucrats.”

He added that anyone who doesn’t think Asian carp pose a crisis should spend a little time on a boat in the Illinois River — something PBS viewers will see on May 28.

Photo captions:

Wayne State University Law School Associate Professor of Law Noah Hall comes face to face with an Asian carp while a PBS film crew looks on.

A PBS production team, including Stephen Ives, director; Chris Buchanan, field producer; and Buddy Squires, cinematographer, sets sail on the Illinois River.

Dozens of Asian carp leap out of the water of the infested Illinois River, endangering boaters.

The judge earned her juris doctor degree summa cum laude from Wayne Law in 1976. She also earned a master’s degree in education from the University of Chicago, and a bachelor’s degree cum laude from Cornell University. She began her law career as a judicial clerk to U.S. Senior District Judge Ralph Freeman, and spent 14 years as a private practice attorney with Detroit-based Dykema Gossett in its commercial litigation section.

President George H. W. Bush appointed Judge Edmunds, a Detroit native, as a federal judge for the Eastern District of Michigan in 1992, and she assumed senior status for the court after serving on that bench for 20 years.

Along the way, the judge has presided over some newsworthy cases, most recently the 2013 federal case against former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. Last year, Judge Edmunds presided over the “Christmas Day Underwear Bomber” trial, and made several crucial decisions to ensure the defendant’s right to a fully fair trial would be protected despite his notoriety.

She made another critical decision in 2002, when she presided over Detroit Free Press v. Ashcroft, a case that arose in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The judge ruled that it was a violation of the First Amendment for the government to designate certain immigration hearings as “special interest cases” and close them to the public. Her decision was affirmed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. That opinion, written by another Wayne Law alumnus, Judge Damon Keith, contained the much-quoted statement, “Democracies die behind closed doors.”

Judge Edmunds has served with distinction on the Law School’s Board of Visitors for many years, including four years as chair of that board, which is an advisory body to the dean. In 2012, she was presented with a Wayne State University Distinguished Alumni Award honoring her outstanding service to the university and her distinguished service in the field of justice.

She is active in a number of professional and civic organizations, and served on the board of trustees of Temple Beth El, on the board of governors for Cranbrook/Kingswood Schools, and as a board of trustees member of the Jewish Community Relations Council.

Also competing were Wayne Law students Kyle Kamidoi and Ryan Fishman, oralists, with brief writer Stephen Frey.

The teams are made up of third-year students selected through competitive tryouts, and work hard throughout most of the year to get ready for the event, which involves a hypothetical appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. This year’s topic was false arrest, malicious prosecution and the Fourth Amendment.

Murphy said that her team was “ranked in the highest of the middle brackets, thanks to Nick’s well-written brief.”

Legal Writing Instructor Amy Neville travelled with the teams and served as faculty advisor.

The competitors said they were grateful to her and other faculty members, alumni and local practitioners who helped them prepare in practice arguments, and also thanked the Law School’s Business Office staff for helping arrange their funding, travel and accommodations.

The teammates have selected their successors for next year: oralists Lauren Saad, Kevin McQuillan, Wade Fink and Katie LaForest; and briefwriters Blair Gould and Katie Morin. Evan Malinowski was selected as alternate.

Photo caption:

Wayne State University Law School ABA national moot court teammates Bonnie Smith (left), Frances Murphy and Nick Ranke share a moment after the competition in St. Louis.

The team placed third in the region for its buyer’s draft of a purchase agreement amendment during the National Transactional LawMeet, a skills competition for students interested in a transactional law practice. The event took place recently at Northwestern University Law School in Chicago. The team placed fourth in the region overall.

The fictional problem before the competitors was based on a stock purchase agreement that had been signed by two parties, said Professor Eric Zacks, faculty advisor for Wayne Law’s team. The target company was s a medical diagnostics company that became “embroiled in intellectual property litigation and an FDA investigation” between the times that the stock sale agreement was signed and the deal had closed. Each competing team was assigned to represent either the buyer or seller, and to negotiate an amendment to the purchase agreement to address the changed situation.

“While we are proud of our accomplishment, I am confident that we can use our experience to help the program at Wayne State prepare a team to do even better next year,” said law student Chris Attar, team captain.

He, and his fellow team members, students Chris Banerian and Weiling Chou, found the competition to be a learning experience beyond compare.

“Drafting an amendment to a stock purchase agreement, marking up the opposing counsel’s draft of that same amendment, and negotiating all of its terms allowed us to learn more than I can explain,” Attar said. “The experience was something that we would not have been able to get without participating in the competition. We learned so much about the legal, economic and other aspects that go into conducting a ‘deal.’”

Zacks said Wayne Law had more than a dozen students participate in the two-week merger and acquisitions online course leading up to the competition, as well as the preliminary rounds. During one of the preliminary rounds, Banerian finished in the top three nationally.

Wayne Law’s transactional law team comprised the three students who went to Chicago and four others — Erick Hosner, Michael Khalil, Katie VanderVeen and Marianna Wess — who “helped behind the scenes as the students drafted a transactional agreement, held mock conference calls with clients, negotiated with the other side, and revised the other team’s proposed drafts,” Zacks said.

The students compete under the aegis of Wayne Law’s new Program for Entrepreneurial and Business Law.

“Part of the PEBL program is designed to give students interested in transactional law a chance to develop the necessary skills to be a successful deal lawyer in real-world situations,” Zacks said.

“The PEBL program aims to create as many opportunities as possible for students to explore transactional law beyond the four walls of the classroom, and competitions like this are an integral part of that,” said Professor Eric Williams, director of PEBL. “I think the team’s recent performance at Northwestern speaks volumes to the enthusiasm and skill our students bring to the table.”

Caption: Wayne Law transactional law team members Weiling Chou (left), Chris Attar and Chris Banerian share a moment after competition in Chicago.

Wayne State University Law School Dean Jocelyn Benson has advocated for voting rights for many years, created and directed the Michigan Allies Project to track hate incidents and give legal support to victims, and supported equality in a hundred other ways.

Now, Benson will be honored by the Detroit Branch of the NAACP with its 2013 Great Expectations Award on April 28 at the group’s 58^th annual Fight for Freedom Fund Dinner at the Cobo Conference Center in Detroit.

“Freedom fighters,” is what the Rev. Dr. Wendell Anthony, president of the Detroit Branch, called Benson and fellow Great Expectations Award recipient Bankole Thompson, senior editor of the Michigan Chronicle.

Others being awarded at the dinner include author and Georgetown University Professor Michael Dyson, who will receive the 2013 Ida B. Wells Freedom and Justice Award; and Detroit Councilwoman JoAnn Watson, who will receive the 2013 Mary Church Terrell Freedom and Justice Award.

“These individuals reflect the spirit of freedom and justice and the continued struggle for justice by many in our nation who believe that freedom must never be defaulted,” Anthony said.

Keynote speaker at the event will be House Democratic Leader Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi. The theme for this year’s dinner is “Freedom Must Never Be Defaulted, It Must Forever Be Exalted!”

“I am proud and humbled to receive this award from the NAACP, an organization that has made a profound impact on the causes of freedom, justice and equality in our nation for so many decades,” Benson said.

Benson joined the Wayne Law faculty in 2005, and served as associate director of the Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights before being named interim dean of the Law School in 2012. She founded and is the executive director of the nonpartisan Michigan Center for Election Law, which hosts projects that support transparency and integrity in elections. Her areas of expertise include election law, education law, race and the law, and civil procedure.

Prior to joining the law faculty, Benson clerked for Judge Damon J. Keith on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. She also worked as a legal assistant to Nina Totenberg at National Public Radio and investigated hate groups and hate crimes for the Southern Poverty Law Center.

After receiving a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College, Benson earned a master of philosophy as a Marshall Scholar at Oxford University and her law degree from Harvard Law School.

Tickets for the Fight for Freedom Fund Dinner are available now. Individual tickets are $150. For more details or to purchase tickets, call 313-871-2087 or visit www.detroitnaacp.org.

 NALP —The Association for Legal Career Professionals —is a nonprofit educational association designed to continuously improve legal career counseling and planning, legal recruitment and retention, and the professional development of law students and lawyers.  

Most recently, both Fears and Fox have been called upon to write articles in their respective areas of expertise for the organization. 

Fears co-authored an article titled “An Update on Federal Hiring Reform” for the November 2012 edition of the bulletin.    Fears’ efforts in the Career Services Office focus primarily upon public service.  Her advising specialties include government employment opportunities including state and federal judicial clerkships, and public interest opportunities such as post-graduate fellowships.

 Fears works tirelessly to make sure these types of significant opportunities are available to Wayne Law students through the school’s Student Voluntary Pro Bono Program.  As a member of the Board of Directors for the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Project, where law students provide legal counsel to jobless workers with the supervision of licensed attorneys,  Fears further encourages students to become in worthwhile public service.

Fox wrote an article titled “The Match Game:  Connecting Law Students and Lawyers as an Approach to Employer Outreach,” which was published in the January 2013 edition of the bulletin.  In the article, Fox shares some of her innovative techniques for creating networks between law students and legal employers.  This includes the annual “An Evening at the Ballpark with Wayne Law”, an event where law students mingle with legal employers during a picnic at a Detroit Tigers baseball game.

She also works with law firms to set-up law firm tours for law students, and organizes numerous events that allow students to network with attorneys during the academic year, including MentorJet — a program similar to speed dating in which law students speak with 10-12 mentors in 6-minute time periods. 

 James Leipold, NALP executive director, said he thinks Fox’s article is the best employer outreach article the publication has seen, offering tangible ideas that are new to many NALP members.  Fox also has published several book reviews for the NALP Bulletin and continues to review publications and provide insight to NALP regarding the resources the organization offers for purchase to its members.

Both Fears and Fox said they find it incredibly satisfying to help students and alumni explore their career options, develop a career or job search strategy, and then celebrate with them as they achieve their goals.  Writing articles for a national publication allows them to share this enthusiasm on a larger scale.

Fears earned her J.D. from Wayne Law in 1989, and Fox earned her J.D. from Hamline University School of Law in 1998.

She has a full speaking schedule this month, as she advocates for education and judicial reform.

Kelly, a 1971 Wayne Law alumna who served for 16 years on the Michigan Supreme Court and was chief justice from 2009-11, was prevented from running again for the high court by the state Constitution, which bars judicial candidates over the age of 70 from running for office.  She disagrees with the provision, and her energy and activism work to underscore her objection to the age rule.

 On April 4, Kelly was featured on a 30-minute interview with Henry Gornbein on the Bloomfield Community TV cable show “Practical Law.” She spoke about her work at Wayne Law and her experiences on the state Supreme Court.

She’ll be the keynote speaker on April 23 at the 19^th annual Youth Law Conference in Troy.

“This is for high school students, and is sponsored by the Oakland County Bar Association,” Kelly said. “I’ll be speaking on my life and experiences on the bench.”

On April 26, Kelly will speak to state librarians in Lansing about the Michigan Legal Help Program, and how “they can help the impoverished get free legal assistance,” Kelly said.

As the state Supreme Court chief justice in 2010, Kelly established the Solutions on Self-Help Task Force to promote quality legal assistance for people of limited means who have to represent themselves in simple civic legal matters, such as divorces and evictions. The effort, she said, was needed to help close “the justice gap.” The task force created the Michigan Legal Help Program.

The program’s website, www.MichiganLegalHelp.org, offers accurate information and simple online forms for users who are representing themselves in legal matters.

On April 27, Kelly will speak to the State Bar of Michigan Representative Assembly on another of her projects, the state’s Judicial Selection Task Force, and its efforts to improve the way judges are elected. The task force’s report advocates open disclosure of campaign spending for judicial elections to “expose special interest groups seeking to twist the supreme court’s jurisprudence for private gain” and also advocates eliminating “the role of the political parties in selecting supreme court candidates in favor of an open primary.” Kelly is co-chair of the task force and passionate about its goals.

The busy “jurist in residence” also has been a guest lecturer in Law School classrooms, including a recent visit teaching students in Distinguished Professor of Law John Dolan’s course on Property Law.

The Wayne Law Moot Court Outside Competitions Team recently wrapped up its 2013 season with one of the more successful years for the program.

The team, made up of 10 junior members selected through competitive tryouts, travels to four different competitions that represent four different areas of the law. Senior members who competed the previous year return to serve as coaches, and bring in local practitioners, alumni and professors to judge the competitors during their practices.

Some key changes took place this year in the lineup of competitions, and four teams were created, putting a greater emphasis on succeeding at competitions with "a heavier brief component than in prior years," said Kaitlyn Cramer, outside competitions director for the program.

“I credit these changes, proposed by my fellow senior member coaches, as integral to our success, along with the amazing talent and depth of this year’s squad,” Cramer said. “They have worked incredibly hard and represented our school and our alumni well. Along with this year’s success at the Philip C. Jessup International Moot Court competition (Cramer is a Jessup team member) and National Environmental Law Moot Court competition at Pace Law School, our moot court program is undoubtedly turning heads.”

The faculty advisor for the Wayne Law Moot Court Outside Competitions Team is Legal Writing Instructor Amy Neville, and the team members thanked her for her valuable guidance and support.

The four outside competitions for the team this year were:

*The 29^th annual Cardozo/MBI Entertainment and Communications Law Moot Court Competition, held Feb. 28-March 3 at Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, New York. Wayne Law competitors were Jake Vorkapich and Christina Bertrand coached by Rebecca McNulty and Frances Murphy. The team moved on to the octofinals of the contest, and Vorkapich was named seventh-best oralist in a field of 64 students.

*The 37^th annual Robert F. Wagner National Labor and Employment Law Moot Court Competition, held March 21-24 at the New York Law School. Wayne Law competitors were Kevin McQuillan, Stephanie Eisenberg and Lauren Saad, coached by Kate McCarthy and Jarett Smith. The team moved on to the octofinals of the contest, and won third-place best petitioner brief out of nearly 40 schools competing.

*The 20^th annual John J. Gibbons Criminal Procedure Moot Court Competition, held March 22-23 at Seton Hall University School of Law in New Jersey. Wayne Law competitors were Michael Butterfield and Wade Fink, coached by Kyle Kamidoi and Ryan J. Fishman.

*The 28^th annual Dean Jerome Prince Memorial Evidence Competition, held April 4-6 at Brooklyn Law School in New York. Wayne Law competitors were Blair Gould, Evan Malinowski and Joseph Gale, coached by Cramer and Bonnie Smith.

Photo caption:

Members of the 2012-13 Wayne Law Moot Court Outside Competitions Team are Evan Malinowski (left), Joseph Gale, Blair Gould, Michael Butterfield, Kevin McQuillan, Stephanie Eisenberg, Jake Vorkapich, Christina Bertrand, Lauren Saad and Wade Fink.

Students, clients and professors are singing the praises of Wayne State University Law School’s new Patent Procurement Law Clinic after its first year.

Wayne Law developed the clinic last year, and it’s the only school in Michigan — and among only a few dozen law schools nationwide — chosen by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a participating clinic certified for the office’s pilot program.   The clinic’s legal services are free of charge to qualifying clients, and are provided by upper-level law students with degrees in engineering or science supervised by Professor Thomas Helmholdt, a patent attorney since 1988.

"The clinic started out with a tremendous first semester,” he said. “Clinic director Professor Eric Williams and our staff assistant, Min Jian Huang, were instrumental in coordinating with incoming students and getting the clinic running smoothly last fall.”

From the start, the clinic has had a “steady stream” of small business startups and inventors looking for legal help to get patent protection, he said.

“In the first semester, the clinic received more applications from prospective clients than the initial student class could handle,” Helmholdt said. “The accepted clients were selected based on the technology of the client’s invention and the prior educational and work experience background of the students in the clinic, the potential benefit to Michigan’s economy of the invention, and the economic need of the client.”

The five students participating in the clinic’s first semester have educational backgrounds that included biomedical engineering, computer engineering, electrical engineering, manufacturing engineering, materials engineering and mechanical engineering. And all are hoping to practice patent law some day.

 “I learned a tremendous amount and gained valuable hands-on experience that will definitely help me when I step foot into my first job as a patent attorney,” said law student Tiane Brown, who has a master’s degree in biomedical engineering and a master’s degree in business administration. “I chose to study patent law because it offered me an opportunity to utilize my engineering skills in the legal field. The clinic is run like a mini law firm, so it is a great opportunity to have in preparation for an internship or a job in an intellectual property firm.”

Helmholdt, who is teaching two patent clinic courses this semester involving eight students, took the first-semester students on a tour of the new USPTO Detroit Satellite Office and introduced them to its services and staff.

“Students had the opportunity to get online in the Public Search Room and to conduct a patent search for their clients,” he said. “The clinic also envisions partnering with the Detroit Office on future projects relating to public education regarding the patent process.”

The clinic’s first-semester clients have been enthusiastic about its services, Helmholdt said. A new website (http://www.patentlawclinic.com ) has been launched to offer news and updates on the progress of the clinic’s clients in the future.

“As an entrepreneur who is developing a small startup company, I found the WSU PPLC to be an indispensable asset,” said clinic client Marc Alpern of Marc Alpern Design LLC.

“Professor Helmholdt did a great job helping one of his students file a utility patent documenting an invention of mine,” said clinic client Kenan Wollborg, an innovation engineer with Innovate ED.

“While in this clinic, I worked closely with Professor Helmholdt and one of his law students to draft a full utility patent application for one of my inventions,” said clinic client Jeff Plott, a research assistant at The University of Michigan “I am very satisfied with the final result.”

“The work that was done was amazing,” said clinic client Jason Beale, co-founder of Regain Go. “To be part of the law clinic has been a blessing for our company.”

Clinic student Younghoon Jang, who has degrees in electrical engineering, computer engineering and Korean law, said he enjoyed working with clients in a setting that offers students “full experience.”

“I had a great time with my client, and successfully field a patent application,” he said. “Before Wayne Law, I had worked for Korean intellectual property law firms for over seven years. Most of my clients are large-scale companies that need worldwide IP protection. While products and services, including IP matters, quickly spread worldwide, there is no uniform worldwide system for IP protection. That is why I came to the United States.”

As the clinic grows and thrives, it will be able to help more clients and train more law students.

“The inventor clients we had first semester were all enthusiastic about their inventions and had a lot of appreciation for the clinic,” said clinic student Bonnie Smith, whose undergraduate degree is in materials science and engineering. “I think once the clinic is more publicized and grows in both students and clients, it has the potential to draw some interesting and varying technology. The patent clinic is very beneficial to Wayne State, Detroit and the surrounding communities.”

The team recently competed at Pace Law School in New York and won the award for Best Brief – Intervenor Appellant. The team also advanced through oral arguments to the quarterfinals of the National Environmental Law Moot Court Competition, which was held in February..

Johns, who serves as team captain, earned a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering at Purdue University. Wayne earned her bachelor’s at Michigan State University in international relations with a specialization in Latin American and Caribbean Studies. And Cox earned his bachelor’s in English with a focus on film studies.

The three teammates put in countless hours researching, writing and editing their award-winning brief and practicing their oral arguments.

“I can remember spending 32 hours with the team in one of the final weekends,” Johns said. “For the oral arguments portion, we probably practiced or otherwise honed our arguments 15 hours per week since the start of this semester.”

Their dedication and talent paid off, and Professor Nicholas Schroeck, who works with the team, is impressed.

“Our team did exceptionally well,” he said, calling the best brief award “a huge honor, being that about 30 teams wrote their brief for that side.”

The 72 teams involved could choose one of three parties to represent for the competition’s fictional lawsuit — plaintiff-appellant, intervenor-appellant or defendant-appellee.

“The plaintiff was an environmental citizen group who sued a farmer for illegally clearing wetlands,” Johns said. “The intervenor-appellant was the state environmental agency. The competition takes place at the federal appeals court level.”

  All three students are interested in environmental law and want to work someday in Michigan. Johns and Cox hope to work in an environmental law field after graduation, while Wayne plans to seek a job in international business. Johns, originally from Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham and now a Detroit resident, is in his third year of law school, and Cox and Wayne are in their second year. Cox lives in Lincoln Park and Wayne is a Novi resident.

Photo caption: Wayne State University Law School’s team members — Captain Robert Johns (left), Jessica Wayne and Kenneth Cox — hold their award for Best Brief – Intervenor –Appellant earned during National Environmental Law Moot Court Competition held last month at Pace Law School in New York. The team advanced through oral arguments to quarter-finals, also held last month at Pace.

The Wayne Law teammates — Kaitlyn Cramer, Jessica Wayne, Bonsitu Kitaba, Klaudia Nikolli and Hom — competed against 111 other law school teams from 82 nations, from Afghanistan to Venezuela, in Washington, D.C., where the final round of the 2013 Jessup competition took place. In February, the Wayne Law women won the Midwest regional tournament in Chicago.  The final 111 teams in Washington were honed from 631 law schools in 92 countries that competed in preliminary Jessup rounds.

This year, the 54^th season for the world’s largest and most prestigious moot court competition, teams from Bahrain, Iran, Macau, Sierra Leone and Trinidad and Tobago participated for the first time.

“The Wayne team came away from the Jessup tournament with a set of remarkable accomplishments,” said Professor Gregory Fox, faculty advisor to the team and director of the Program for International Studies at Wayne Law. “After finishing 18^th in the world in the preliminary rounds, they faced India in the first elimination round. Unfortunately, we lost the round by one point out of nine possible points. But the loss had an important post-script: The Indian team went on to win the entire tournament. So we came very close to beating the world champion. As far as we know, this is the best showing ever by a Wayne Jessup team.”

Law School Dean Jocelyn Benson thanked the students and the many faculty members who worked with the team all year for their hard work and contributions to the team’s preparation. The team also was assisted by Miller Canfield senior litigation partners Frederick Acomb, Thomas Cranmer, Joseph Galvin (a 1971 Wayne Law alumnus) and Clarence Pozza, who judged several of its practice rounds.

“I am immensely proud of these exceptional students who have earned a great achievement,” Benson said. “They have mastered some very difficult international law issues and developed skills they will use for the rest of their careers.”

The teammates are still “ecstatic,” and were “incredibly overwhelmed” when their names were called during the awards ceremony, Hom said. “It was the best time of my life,” Nikolli said.

“The executive director of the International Law Student Association (which administers the competition) referred to us as ‘the famous ladies of Wayne State,’ a nickname she gave us at the regional rounds in Chicago,” Hom said. “As proud as I am to be a member of this all-female team, it was amazing to see similar all-female teams from countries such as Taiwan, Ethiopia and Iran, in particular.”

Wayne Law has a long tradition of success in the Jessup competition, where students represent countries in a fictional case before the International Court of Justice, the judicial organ of the United Nations. This year’s Jessup “problem” addressed the consequences of global climate change on statehood, migration and sovereign debt. The scenario focused on a debt-ridden island nation that was swallowed by the ocean, forcing its people to relocate and causing its remaining funds to be seized.

For the competition, students prepare oral and written pleadings arguing both the applicant and respondent positions of the fictional problem case, engaging the teammates in legal research as well as preparing written submissions to a court and presenting oral arguments in a courtroom setting. Wayne Law’s team finished 19^th in the world this year for best brief.

“The Jessup is something much larger than a moot court competition,” Hom said. “It represents the evolving world realities and the direction that international law is heading, leaving it up to the students to implement the changes we’d like to see. At the onset of the week, we were all given notebooks with this reminder: ‘In the future, world leaders will look at each other differently because they first met here as friends.’”

And after all the hard work, the competitors got a chance to unwind and socialize during several events, including the Go National Ball, where team members dress in traditional garb from their home countries.

“Friends from Uganda, Indonesia and many Asian and African teams went all out in full traditional dress, and were teaching us some of their traditional dance moves,” Hom said. “In return, we were teaching them how to ‘Dougie.’ We recognize that was not a fair trade. The Wayne team dressed up as the Tigers baseball team, and Professor Fox held out as a Red Sox player. It was just a great event to observe and be a part of.

“We just feel lucky to be a part of this whole experience, and give endless thanks to the Wayne Law faculty and Detroit area attorneys for volunteering their time, effort and financing to allow us to get here.”

Note: Tryouts for next year’s Wayne Law Jessup team are scheduled from noon to 5 p.m. April 12 in the Moot Courtroom of the Law School Building. For more details, contact Nikolli at 519-990-9457 or dv3844@wayne.edu.

 Photo caption:

Wayne Law’s Philip C. Jessup International Moot Court team members Klaudia Nikolli (left); Jessica Wayne; Bonsitu Kitaba; Kaitlyn Cramer; and Rachel Hom, chancellor of the team, show off their Detroit Tigers garb, while Professor Gregory Fox, faculty advisor for the team, sports a Red Sox jersey. Competitors at the final round of the competition were invited to wear the dress of their home countries for a “Go National Ball” after the finals.

She recently learned that she had won the fellowship for her project, Boots on the Ground, which “will be instrumental in helping veterans and their families gain the legal services and support services they need to become self-sufficient, as well as promote community and pro bono involvement with helping our veterans, as well,” she said.

She competed with more than 500 other applicants to gain the post-graduate fellowship, and she’s not only thrilled, but already hard at work on her own time to get the project rolling.

Adams has felt a calling to practice public interest law since she was a child, but she followed quite a few other paths before she found her way into law school. She served in the Air Force from 1985-90, and then went on to a series of different jobs, including eight years as an EMT on an ambulance in a high poverty area of Nashville, Tenn. She moved to Ohio, where she had grown up, and earned certification as a respiratory therapist, and moved to New York, where she earned a degree in women and gender studies at State University of New York-Brockport.

From there, she found Wayne Law, and has been attending the school’s evening program while she works full-time as a respiratory therapist at Sinai-Grace Hospital in northwest Detroit. She’s seen plenty of hardship there, too.

Law school exams aren’t too stressful when you “go to work and you see kids who’ve been shot and people who can’t afford their meds,” Adams said. “For me, working in health care, especially in an impoverished neighborhood, keeps you balanced as to what’s important.”

Her experience, her down-to-earth approach and her sense of mission have served her well. She’s earned a number of public interest fellowships as a law student, and now she’ll get a chance to administer her Boots on the Ground project, working with Akron Community Legal Aid Services in Ohio.

“I already have a managing attorney who will guide me, and the host organization is extremely committed to the project,” Adams said. “We’ll be working with a communications group to start developing outreach, and we’re trying to bring the University of Akron Law School on board, too.  I’ll be meeting with individuals at the VA Medical Center to find out what services they provide, and with local bar associations and legal firms to teach them about the issues veterans have and bring them on board to help with the project.”

Boots on the Ground will start with eight counties in Ohio, from the Akron area to the West Virginia state line. Adams is sponsored by the Ohio Legal Assistance Foundation, an organization that focuses on ensuring that resources, programs and services exist statewide to serve the unmet civil legal needs of Ohio's low-income population. Administering the project will mean “a lot of legal work and community engagement work,” Adams said. “It’s a legal job, but it’s more than that. That’s why I really like the project.”

She feels tremendous empathy for military veterans who may have sustained hardship through their service, including post-traumatic stress disorder, and through their attempts to “assimilate back into society,” she said. “There’s a lot of work that has to be done, not only with veterans but with their families. We really have to reach out to them and let them know there are things available to them. I can’t relate to every story everybody has, but I’m a veteran, I have a military family, and I know many active military families. I think I can relate to them and listen and pick out the things they need.”

Many veterans in need have legal issues in areas such as housing, benefits, employment and education, she said, but “if you can’t communicate with them, you’ll never get to the legal issues,” Adams said. “Sometimes it’s a pride issue. Nobody really wants a handout, but a lot of people want a hand up. When people hear ‘no’ enough times, they get gun-shy about asking for things. We will combine legal advocacy and access to support services.”

The mission of Equal Justice Works is “to create a just society by mobilizing the next generation of lawyers committed to equal justice.”  That suits Adams to a T, and so does her education at Wayne Law, where her goal to practice public interest law has been “well nurtured,” she said.

“If you’re going to be an effective lawyer, you have to be able to represent anybody,” Adams said. “I think this place helps you learn that. It’s been a wonderful journey here.”

Information about Adams’ Boots on the Ground project can be found on Twitter at #BOOTSPROJECT13.

A new Student Board of Governors has been elected by Wayne State University Law School students, and so have professors of the year.

Associate Professor Janet Findlater came out on top as First-Year Professor of the Year for the 18^th time since she joined the Wayne Law faculty in 1976. Assistant Professor Eric Zacks was named Upperclass Professor of the Year for the second year in a row. He joined the faculty in 2010.

Kevin Kresch was chosen as president of the Student Board of Governors for 2013-14.

“I hope that by working with student organizations, the deans, and listening to students’ concerns, we can continue to create the best possible learning environment for students and future lawyers,” Kresch said.

SBG officers for the coming year are Ana Campos, vice president; Zach Rowley, treasurer; Blake Edwards, secretary; Justin Hanna, American Bar Association representative; Deborah Johnson, Student Senate representative; Marcia West and Adam Kessler, 2L day governors; Nora Youkhana and Chris Chesney, 2L evening governors; Henry Ibe and Melissa Brown, 3L day governors.

Student governors at large are Katie LaForest, Stephen Johnston, Mike Szparaga, Emily Mayer, Chelsey Marsh, Katie VanderVeen, Luke Wolfe, Wade Fink, Angela Strobel, Nick Jones, Zainab Sabbagh, Lauren Samona, Nishal Patel, Karrine Marcolini, Nadine Yousif and Sumeet Aggarwal.

SBG meets every other week in Room 1245 in the Law School, and encourages Wayne Law students to attend and voice their ideas and concerns. The board appoints law students to serve on several student-faculty committees; publishes Dicta; and organizes schoolwide and social charitable activities, such as the Wayne Law Ambulance Chase, blood drives and mentoring programs.

“I have spent the last year working closely on SBG with your future student leaders, and I am proud to say that I have the utmost faith in them next year,” said outgoing SBG President Jack Schulz.

Wayne State University Law School congratulates the student members of the 2013-2014 Wayne Law Review Editorial Board.

 The board: Lynn Bartkowiak, editor-in-chief; Elizabeth Gotham, managing editor; Suzanne Sutherland, production editor; Emily Mayer, executive articles editor; Chelsey Marsh, executive note and comment editor; Stephanie Eisenberg, symposium editor; Angela Strobel, technology editor; Andrew Eurich, voting senior articles editor; and Joshua Noffke, voting note and comment editor.

 “The newest members of the Wayne Law Review editorial board reflect the diverse and unique set of skills that our law school students have to offer,” said Dean Jocelyn Benson. “They are smart, creative, analytical and thoughtful leaders on campus who will go on to serve as influential leaders of Michigan's legal community.  We are proud of all they have accomplished and will continue to accomplish as the next generation of advocates for justice.”

 The board begins its tenure on May 20, the first Monday following the Wayne Law commencement ceremony.

 “I am thankful for the opportunity to serve as editor-in-chief with such a qualified and experienced board,” said Bartkowiak. “We are eager to advance the legacy of the Law Review in the coming year. The Review is excited to welcome local and national experts this fall for a symposium discussing the effects of state constitutionalism in celebration of the 50^th anniversary of the Michigan Constitution. We also look forward to implementing a variety of changes to increase the efficiency of our well-respected publication.”

 The Wayne Law Review is one of two scholarly journals edited and produced by Wayne Law students. The Law Review contains articles, book reviews, transcripts, notes, and comments by prominent academics, practitioners, and students on timely legal topics. Each year, one of the issues highlights a topic of interest discussed at the Law Review’s annual symposium. Another issue features an annual survey of developments in Michigan law, which is widely read by members of the Michigan legal community. Students with high academic standing are invited to join the Wayne Law Review following a writing competition held each summer. Junior and senior members produce the publication under the direction of a senior administrative board. A faculty adviser oversees the general operation. For more information about the Law Review, email lawreview@wayne.edu.

 Cutline: Andrew Eurich (top row, left), Stephanie Eisenberg, Angela Strobel, Chelsey Marsh, Emily Mayer and Joshua Noffke, Elizabeth Gotham (bottom row, left), Lynn Bartkowiak and Suzanne Sutherland

Imagine that you’ve been arrested and wrongly charged with a serious crime, and that you haven’t the money to hire an attorney. A panel of legal professionals at Wayne State University Law School on March 25 lent their expertise to consider what happens next in that instance.

Fifty years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Gideon V. Wainwright to extend the Sixth Amendment, requiring state courts to guarantee every criminal defendant in a felony trial the right to a lawyer regardless of ability to pay.

But for lawyers representing the poor today, that system is “in a state of crisis,” in the words of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

And the sequester — a group of automatic federal spending cuts now in place unless and until Congress acts to change them — is putting access to justice for poor federal defendants in even more jeopardy, according to the panelists at a March 25 event held at Wayne Law School to commemorate the watershed Gideon ruling a half century ago. The event was sponsored by the Law School’s Office of the Dean, Wayne Law’s Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights and by the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Michigan.

Speakers were U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade; State Appellate Defender Office Assistant Defender Valerie Newman; Federal Defender Office Chief Defender Miriam Siefer; U.S. District Judge Paul Borman; and Mark Fancher, racial justice staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union.  The discussion was moderated by Wayne County Circuit Judge Edward Ewell. He’s a Wayne Law graduate, as are Siefer and Newman.

“With sequestration, the federal defendant program, like all federal programs, is being hit very, very hard,” Siefer said.

Because of the sequester, attorneys in her office must take a 21-day furlough beginning in April, and during those mandatory days off, they will not be allowed to talk to a defendant or work on a case in progress in any way, she said.

“To have the caseloads that we do, and then to have this hiatus is really unconscionable,” Siefer said.

Newman asked the students and others in the audience to imagine themselves as unjustly accused, impoverished defendants.

“Your liberty is at stake and your life is in tatters,” she said. “Very minor convictions can have significant impacts on the rest of your life.”

Access to justice is more important than budget cuts, she said.

“There are certain things you have to find money for,” Newman said.

The right to “adequate and reasonable representation” guaranteed by Gideon 50 years ago for indigent defendants in the state system isn’t working the way it should, especially in Michigan, where each county handles the appointment of defense counsel for the poor in its own way without any state standards or regulatory guidance and without any state funding structure, Fancher said.

He spoke of clients often “detained for extended periods of time without ever meeting their lawyers,” and then, on the day of a hearing, having their appointed attorney meet with a prosecutor at the courthouse, get some sort of plea bargain deal, and urge the clients to plead guilty and take the deal, without ever knowing the details of the case or if the clients were innocent or guilty.

The Michigan Advisory Commission on Indigent Defense, appointed by Gov. Rick Snyder in 2011, has found that the state’s patchwork of systems does not meet the American Bar Association’s principles and is “significantly underfunded.”

Fancher talked about an ongoing ACLU lawsuit against the state challenging its indigent defense system as unconstitutional, and of legislation “about to be introduced” to “assess and reform the system.”

“The intent is to establish standards across the board,” Fancher said.

McQuade said that even though she’s a federal prosecutor and Newman is a state defender, both agree that “cost is irrelevant” when it comes to giving indigent defendants in both federal and state courts their constitutional rights.

McQuade said there’s a “cost to public confidence” in the justice system to consider, as well as very real monetary costs that come from inadequate lawyering for poor defendants.

“There is a very significant cost when you don’t get it right the first time,” McQuade said, noting that appeals are costly to the public. “Nobody wins when defendants do not get adequate representation.”

Note: Assistant Defender Valerie Newman, an expert on arguing before the Supreme Court, on the importance of the Gideon ruling and on the modern day application of a criminal defendant's right to counsel, is available to speak to media.To arrange an interview, contact Carol Baldwin, Wayne Law communications director, at 313-577-4629 or carol.baldwin@wayne.edu.

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This year’s reunion weekend will start with a reception on Friday, Sept. 27, which will be followed by a tailgate party and a Wayne State University football game as well as a tour of Detroit’s booming Midtown on Saturday, Sept. 28. That night, the Treasure of Detroit Gala, Wayne Law’s premier event to honor those who have made a lasting contribution to the practice of law and the growth and success of the Law School, will take place. The event will include a cocktail reception, silent auction, dinner and awards program.

On Sunday, Sept. 29, Dean Jocelyn Benson will host a send-off breakfast for alumni.

The classes of 1943, 1948, 1953, 1958, 1963, 1968, 1973, 1978, 1983, 1988, 1993, 1998, 2003, 2008 and 2013 will be specially honored this year.

Information regarding honorees and tickets for the event will be announced soon. Visit law.wayne.edu/alumni to get the latest news. Questions? Email lawalumni@wayne.edu.

Past Treasure of Detroit honorees include:

2012 recipients

Professor and Associate Dean Frederica K. Lombard (1939-2011), Hon. Claudia House Morcom, ’56, George Peck, ’80, Ed Zelenak, ’77

2011 recipients

James K. Robinson, ’68 (honored posthumously), David M. Hempstead, ’75, and A. Alfred Taubman

2010 recipients

Dean A. Robb, '49, Joan Mahoney, '75, and Lawrence C. Mann, '80

2009 recipients

George J. Bedrosian, ’59, Carl Ziemba, ’48 (honored posthumously), and Lifetime Achievement Award recipient Chief Justice Marilyn Kelly, ’71

2008 recipients

John Collins Jr, '76, Hon. Jessica Cooper, '73, Cornelius Pitts, '64, and Georgia Clark

2007 recipients

Elizabeth Phelps Hardy, '84, Hon. Damon J. Keith, LL.M., '56, and Steven I. Victor, '50

2006 recipients

Eric Ersher, '94, David J. Galbenski, '93, LaRissa D. Hollingsworth, '03, Stephanie K. Hoos, '99, and Hon. Adam Shakoor, '76

2005 recipients

Nancy J. Diehl, '78, Sherrie L. Farrell, Cynthia Faulhaber, '82, Prof. Janet Findlater, Aretha L. Glover, '97, Justice Marilyn Kelly, '71, and Eleanor “Coco” Siewert

2004 recipients

Candyce Ewing Abbatt, '83, Hon. Nancy G. Edmunds, '76, Earle I. Erman, '74, Kevin I. Green, '84, Kathryn J. Humphrey, '80, Thomas G. Kienbaum, '68, William A. Sankbeil, '71, and I.W. Winsten, '79

2003 recipients

Mathew T. Englebert, '97, Harvey S. Gettleson, '77, and James R. Lites, '78

2002 recipients

Hon. Avern Cohn, Elliott S. Hall, '65, and Prof. Frederica K. Lombard

2001 recipient

Eugene Driker, '61

2000 recipient

Hon. Damon J. Keith, LL.M., '56

1999 recipient

Dennis Archer

1998 recipients

Hon. Patricia J. Boyle, '63, Christopher C. Nern, '72, and Hon. Dorothy Comstock Riley, '49

The book is published by LexisNexis Law School Publishing, and it examines “the intersection of science, law, evidence and the Constitution,” according to one of the co-authors, Professor Ronald Carlson of the University of Georgia Law School. The other co-authors are Law Professor Edward Imwinkelried of the University of California-Davis and Professor Julie Seaman of Emory University School of Law.

The new edition quotes from the Federal Rules of Evidence as they were “restyled” in 2011, thus giving students “an excellent foundation for understanding the issues posed by the restyling,” Carlson said.

The new edition is designed to be more “user-friendly,” both for students and teachers, the authors note, and has been “streamlined and shortened” from earlier editions.

Beecher-Monas teaches classes on evidence, advanced evidence, corporations, corporate finance, an advanced seminar in corporate governance, and securities regulation at Wayne Law. She joined the faculty in 2005 after nine years as a professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock School of Law.  She is widely published, and often draws on her background in science for articles such as “A Ray of Light for Judges Blinded by Science: Triers of Science and Intellectual Due Process” (33 Georgia Law Review 1047 – 1999) and “Genetic Predictions of Future Dangerousness: Is There a Blueprint for Violence?” (with Edgar Garcia-Rill, 69 Journal of Law and Contemporary Problems 301 – 2006).

In 2009, she was a Fulbright Scholar to China, and she has served as an outside peer reviewer for the National Science Foundation. Before she began her teaching career, she worked as a litigation associate at Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson in New York City.

Beecher-Monas earned her bachelor’s in biology from Florida International University, and a master’s in anatomy and biochemistry from the University of Miami. She graduated magna cum laude from the University of Miami School of Law, and went on to earn an LL.M. and a J.S.D, both from Columbia University School of Law.

Journalists and interested spectators joined students in Partrich Auditorium, where pre-trial motions in a case against the state of Michigan brought by April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse of Hazel Park, a lesbian couple involved in a child custody case, were heard by Friedman. 

The proceedings were part of the Law School’s annual “Motion Day” sponsored by the Legal Research and Writing faculty. Each year during the event, experienced counsel argues actual pretrial motions before Friedman, who rules or takes the matters under advisement. Students are able to observe a variety of oral argument styles, as well as the procedures of the federal district court, all without leaving campus, then converse with the judge afterward.

The plaintiffs in the most recent case are seeking joint custody of their children, which is prohibited now by Michigan law because the couple isn’t married. Rowse has custody of two adopted children, and DeBoer has custody of one adopted child.

The case was expanded last fall when the judge suggested they amend it to include the state’s voter-approved gay marriage ban. If Rowse and DeBoer were allowed to wed legally, they could, by law, have joint custody of their children.

Friedman, after hearing the arguments from both sides, postponed his ruling, which he said would be appealed no matter what he decides, until the U.S. Supreme Court decides two other pending same-sex marriage cases. He said he expects the Supreme Court to have decided both cases by the end of June, which will “give us some direction.” One of those cases is over the constitutionality of California’s 2008 ban on same-sex marriage. The other is over the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

“I think this (Michigan) case is a very important, and I should have the benefit of those cases,” Friedman said, promising a prompt decision as soon as the Supreme Court acts.

After the judge stayed the Michigan case, the lobby outside the Law School auditorium buzzed with national, state and local journalists, who — cameras clicking and whirring away — surrounded the litigants and their attorneys as they left the auditorium.

When the hubbub died away and Friedman had heard other motions on other cases, he joined faculty and students for lunch, and spoke about his appreciation of Wayne Law.

“We love coming here,” the judge said. “We love the students. Wayne Law does a fantastic job. Wayne is the gold standard as far as we’re concerned.”

Law students who attended the proceedings said they found it enlightening and instructive.

“It’s really nice to see oral arguments in context,” said Liz Andary, a third-year Wayne Law student.

She and third-year student Kate McCarthy are concentrating their studies now on family law, and they found the same-sex marriage case “spot on,” as McCarthy put it, to what they’re discussing in classes.

Photo caption: Plaintiffs April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse (at right) are rushed by journalists as they leave Partrich Auditorium at Wayne State University Law School, where arguments on their case were heard by U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman. Photo by Millard Berry.

“More than anything, I’m just happy to have helped the anti-torture movement in India, and I am extremely honored that along with others, a former judge from the high court came to the book release, as well as staff from the National Human Rights Commission,” said Shovein, who expects to graduate in 2014..

He worked in India from May to August 2012, through a Wayne Law International Public Interest Law Fellowship, with MASUM, a human rights and torture law organization. As a MASUM legal intern, Shovein spent two months last summer in a border area of West Bengal, India, and Bangladesh, observing the actions of India’s Border Security Force and interviewing victims of human rights violations by BSF personnel.

He wrote a report about his findings, which MASUM officials have published as a book titled “Killing Field.” The book was released Feb. 9 at the International Kolkata Book Fair, during which victims of trafficking and torture spoke. The program was telecast by national media in India, and attended by various officials, including Malay Sengupta, a former chief justice of the Sikkim High Court.

The International Public Interest Law Fellowships are sponsored by Wayne’s Program for International Legal Studies. Each year, it funds sending a group of law students to intern for legal advocacy organizations around the world. In addition to India, where Shovein and two other students worked last summer, the program has partnerships with organizations in Lebanon, Qatar, Kyrgystan, the Bahamas, Mexico, Thailand and elsewhere.

Human rights work is nothing new to Shovein, who was drawn to Wayne Law in the first place because of its Program for International Legal Studies, its emphasis on public service and the availability of the very fellowship he won, as did three other laws students last year.

“I don’t think students realize how valuable of an opportunity the IPILF is,” Shovein said. “I came to Wayne hoping to receive one, and hoping to do the Asylum and Immigration Law Clinic, and these two experiences have easily been the most valuable in my law school experience. “

“Eric’s amazing experience at MASUM is typical of the kind of work Wayne Law interns are given at our partner organizations,” said Professor Gregory Fox, director of the Program for International Legal Studies. “These are groups confronting profound problems such as human rights abuses, corruption and entrenched discrimination. The interns are given full responsibility in the groups’ struggles for law reform and equal access to justice.”

Shovein has been involved in public service since he received his undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan in 2009. He spent a year with an AmeriCorps program in Lansing promoting the use of vacant lots owned by the Ingham County Land Bank as free community gardens, and helped find materials for the gardeners, with whom he worked throughout the year. After that, he taught English in an elementary school on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe.

He also has studied in France, and trained with the Peace Corps for two months in Cambodia. In April 2011, he returned to Michigan and started work with another AmeriCorps program called BrightStars in Detroit, where he helped young children prepare socially and academically to start school. He worked with both parents and children through BrightStars, and also worked with two friends with a Detroit urban farming project called Food Field.

His goal is to continue his public service after graduation, either working in immigration law or some other type of international human rights law, said Shovein, who grew up in Grosse Pointe Woods.

Photo captions:

Wayne Law student Eric Shovein worked as a teacher in an elementary school on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe before starting law school.

She’s been hired by Deloitte Tax LLP, one of the largest financial advisory firms in the world, to work in the firm’s Detroit office in the Renaissance Center.

“I am thrilled to join such a large and prestigious firm with a well-respected global presence,” Hom said. “I secured the job through on-campus interviews during Wayne State’s fall recruitment. I initially applied for the interview after the prompting of fellow classmates who worked at accounting firms in the city and thought I would find it a good fit. Their recommendations alone are reflective of the Wayne Law community, because it is truly that — a community.”

Hom, who earned her undergraduate degree in political science and sociology at the University of Michigan, said one reason she chose Wayne for law school was for its “strong community presence.” She’s had a broad exposure to international law through her studies with the Law School’s Program for International Studies, which drew her interest soon after she started at Wayne Law.

“Rachel’s enthusiasm for international law is a real inspiration,” said Professor Gregory Fox, director of the program. “She’s applied for every opportunity in our international program, and excelled at them all. Her remarkable success not only reflects her own exceptional talent, but shows how a strong grounding in international topics during law school can lead to success in the job market.”

 “Each opportunity I’ve encountered in law school, locally or abroad, has significantly impacted my career path,” Hom said. “One of the most influential international experiences was studying at The Hague Academy of International Law.”

Hom completed her studies in the Netherlands last summer as a recipient of the Freeman Fellowship, which is awarded once a year to a student studying with the Program for International Legal Studies at Wayne Law so he or she can attend classes at The Hague Academy.

“It was awe-inspiring to be attending classes in The Hague taught by renowned international scholars, and equally as exciting to share desks with students and attorneys from all over the world,” Hom said. “It was a truly international experience. There were over 250 students from almost 100 countries, and I was the only American. It was incredibly eye-opening to be the minority in such a large group, and to gain insight into the diverse cultures, attitudes and backgrounds of those around me.”

While she was in the Netherlands, she met international attorneys who worked with Deloitte.

“Not only were they working with Deloitte, but most were also involved in Jessup International Moot Court in their home country, either in a student or coach capacity,” Hom said.

She is chancellor of Wayne Law’s Jessup team, which has always done well in regional competition, and this year, under Hom’s experienced leadership, came out on top, and soon will be going on to international competition. The Jessup team is another facet of the Program for International Legal Studies at Wayne Law.

Hom also is involved with five different student associations, is a member of the Wayne Law Review, and in 2011, won an International Public interest Law Fellowship to serve as a legal intern with The Bahamas Crisis Centre.  That opportunity also is a feature of the Program for International Legal Studies. Hom worked in 2010 as a foreclosure intern at Orlans Associates PC and in 2012 as a summer associate with Dickinson Wright PLLC.

All of these experiences have strengthened her interest in international law, she said.

“Unlike domestic law, international law provides constant change, conflict and uncertainty in its binding/non-binding governance on various state and private sectors,” Hom said. “Determining which laws to apply and in what capacity is consistently challenging and very exciting.”

She expects to work with client issues relating to tax and accounting events at Deloitte, she said.

“There will be the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the client’s individual and business needs, and a chance to build strong, long-term relationships within a variety of situations,” Hom said. “I look forward to gaining diverse exposure to many areas of tax and in whatever areas my supervisors at Deloitte believe they can best utilize my legal skills and training.”

Photo caption: Wayne Law student Rachel Hom (center) stands with Yves Daudet, secretary general of The Hague Academy of International Law, and his wife at a reception at their home in The Hague.

DETROIT (April 12, 2012) — The Damon J. Keith Law Collection of African American Legal History at Wayne State University Law School has announced that it will be the beneficiary of the papers and records of Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-MI) from the 24 terms he has spent in the U.S. House of Representatives.

The materials will include original documents relating to Conyers’ work promoting civil rights and social justice in Michigan. The Keith Collection is the premier national entity devoted to preserving and educating the public on the contributions of African Americans to the law. This new donation will provide a unique resource for the public to learn about the work of Conyers, a civil rights pioneer.

“I am honored that Congressman Conyers has decided to donate his papers to the Keith Collection,” said Judge Damon J. Keith. “As a U.S. representative and former chair of the House Judiciary Committee, he has made significant contributions as an African American in the law.”

“Judge Keith and I share a lifelong friendship, and we are both alumni of Wayne Law,” Conyers reflected. “The Keith Collection was a natural fit for my materials.” Keith received his LL.M. from Wayne Law in 1956; Conyers received his J.D. in 1958.

The materials will become available to scholars and researchers after they are processed by Wayne State University’s Reuther Library, where they will be housed. 

 “We are thrilled about the donation of these papers to the Keith Collection, as Conyers has been a tireless fighter for equality and a legend in protecting the civil rights of all people,” said I. India Geronimo, director of the Keith Collection. “These papers will be a valuable resource for anyone interested in the history of the civil rights movement.”

The Damon J. Keith Law Collection of African American Legal History at Wayne State University Law School was created to record the history of African American lawyers and judges. The mission of Keith Collection is to collect, preserve, and provide resources pertaining to African American legal history, including the history of prominent African American lawyers, judges, and lawmakers whose service to the community reflects an interest in and commitment to civil rights and social justice. The Keith Collection works in partnership with the Walter P. Reuther Library, a world-renowned archival repository, the Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights and the Wayne State University Law School. For more information on the Keith Collection, visit http://keithcenter.wayne.edu/collection/index.php.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution offering more than 400 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 32,000 students.

For more information about Wayne State University Law School, visit law.wayne.edu.