Here is a list of event participants. Use the index on the right to navigate to each participant’s biographical information on this page.

Alcoff, Linda

Professor of Philosophy, Hunter College

Ms. Alcoff participated in Lacrosse Justice: Gender, Race, and Fairness in the Duke Lacrosse Legal Saga. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Linda Martin Alcoff is a Professor of Philosophy at Hunter College and the CUNY Graduate Center. Ms. Alcoff has degrees from Georgia State University and Brown University, and has held positions at Syracuse University, SUNY Stony Brook and Kalamazoo College, and visiting appointments at Cornell, Brown, Florida Atlantic University, and the University of Aarhus. Her writings have focused on social identity and race, epistemology and politics, sexual violence, Foucault, Dussel, and Latino issues in philosophy.

Ms. Alcoff has written two books: Visible Identities: Race, Gender and the Self (Oxford 2006), Real Knowing: New Versions of the Coherence Theory (Cornell 1996); and she has edited ten, including Feminist Epistemologies co-edited with Elizabeth Potter (Routledge, 1993); Thinking From the Underside of History co-edited with Eduardo Mendieta (Rowman & Littlefield, 2000); Epistemology: The Big Questions (Blackwell, 1998); Identities co-edited with Eduardo Mendieta (Blackwell, 2002); Singing in the Fire: Tales of Women in Philosophy (Rowman and Littlefield 2003); The Blackwell Guide to Feminist Philosophy co-edited with Eva Feder Kittay (Blackwell 2006); Identity Politics Reconsidered co-edited with Michael Hames-Garcia, Satya Mohanty and Paula Moya (Palgrave, 2006); Constructing the Nation: A Race and Nationalism Reader co-edited with Mariana Ortega (SUNY 2009); Saint Paul among the Philosophers co-edited with Jack Caputo (Indiana, 2009); Feminism, Sexuality, and the Return of Religion co-edited with Jack Caputo (Indiana 2011).  Ms. Alcoff is currently at work on two new books: a book on sexual violence, and an account of future of white identity. She is a co-editor of Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy.

Ms. Alcoff has held an ACLS Fellowship, a Society for the Humanities at Cornell University Fellowship, and she was named one of Syracuse University’s first Meredith Professors for Teaching Excellence. She is President of the American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division, for 2012-2013, and has also served on its Executive Committee, Nominating Committee, Program Committee, Committee on the Status of Women, and as Chair of the Committee on Hispanics/Latinos. She also served as Co- Director of SPEP (the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy). Ms. Alcoff was named the Distinguished Woman in Philosophy for 2005 by the Society for Women in Philosophy, and in 2006 she was named one of the 100 Most Influential Hispanics in the United States by Hispanic Business magazine. In September 2011 she was awarded an honorary doctorate degree from the University of Oslo. Her book Visible Identities, won the Frantz Fanon Award in 2009. Ms. Alcoff is originally from Panama, but lives today happily in Brooklyn.

Alper, Joanne F.

Judge, Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Circuit of Virginia

Judge Alper participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series, and Is the Best Defense a Good Offense? The Ethics and Politics of Allowing Judges to Advocate Controversial Views. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Judge Joanne Alper has served on the Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Circuit of Virginia since June 1998. Prior to serving on the Circuit Court, she served as judge of the Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court for the Seventeenth Judicial District as well as chief judge of that court. Before being elevated to the bench, she was in private practice in Arlington, VA. Judge Alper earned her BA degree, magna cum laude, from Syracuse University. She received a Juris Doctor degree, with honors, from George Washington University Law School. Judge Alper’s professional service includes serving as President of the Arlington County Bar Association; President of District 4 of the National Association of Women Judges; President of the Virginia Chapter of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, and Chair of the Family Law Section of the Virginia State Bar Association. Judge Alper is past-president of the Syracuse University National Alumni Association where she was Vice President and chair of the By-Laws, Nominating, and Awards Committees. Judge Alper is currently a member of the Board of Advisors of the Syracuse University College of Law and a member of the Syracuse University Board of Trustees; a member of the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission; a member of the Virginia Model Jury Instructions Committee; and a member of the Education Committee of the Virginia Judicial Conference.

Anand, Rakesh

Associate Professor of Law, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Anand participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Anand graduated from Stanford University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science (with honors and distinction) and from Yale Law School with a Juris Doctor. After graduating from law school, he clerked for Justice Aharon Barak of the Supreme Court of Israel and subsequently spent several years as a civil litigator with Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe in San Francisco. Before coming to Syracuse University, Professor Anand was a Visiting Associate Professor of Law at Chicago-Kent College of Law, during which time he taught classes in legal ethics and criminal law, and received the 2003-04 Faculty Member of the Year award.

Professor Anand’s scholarly interests lie at the intersection of legal theory and legal ethics. More specifically, Professor Anand is writing a series of papers on the “cultural study of the lawyer” (cultural study understood as a form of philosophical-anthropology). The organizing principle of this project is that law in America is a cultural practice and the national commitment thereto — to living as a community under the rule of law — gives rise to a variety of professional obligations for a lawyer, first and foremost of which is that he or she must serve We the People. This argument directly challenges conventional wisdom, which looks not to the American dedication to self-government, but to moral conscience, the adversarial process, or economic self-interest, among other things, when taking up questions of a lawyer’s ethics. A complete list of Professor Anand’s published writing can be found by clicking on the “Publications” link above. His most recently published writing can be downloaded from his SSRN author page.

Arbetter, Susan

State Capitol Correspondent, News & Public Affairs Director, WCNY-TV

Ms. Arbetter participated in New York’s Constitution: Sometimes It’s Just a Suggestion. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Susan Arbetter is an award-winning broadcast journalist.  Ms. Arbetter was creator and host of the radio program Roundtable Show and of the television programNew York Now. Currently, Ms. Arbetter hosts and produces The Capitol Pressroom, a daily WNCY radio show broadcast from the State Capitol in Albany. The Capitol Pressroom features interviews with newsmakers as well as reports by journalists from The New York Times, Newsday, The Albany Times Union, Gannett News Service, and the Associated Press. Ms. Arbetter also hosts The Capitol Report, a television news show covering the New York State legislature and statewide government. The Capitol Pressroom and The Capitol Report are carried by stations throughout New York.

Arcuri, Michael

Former member, U.S. House of Representatives, NY-24
Of Counsel, Hancock Estabrook, LLP

Mr. Arcuri participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Michael Arcuri is a former member of the United States House of Representatives where he served as a member of the Rules Committee. From 1994 through 2006, Mr. Arcuri worked as the Oneida County District Attorney, where, in addition to a strong conviction record, he established the county’s first drug courts, launched the Oneida County Drug Task Force, and created the Oneida County Child Advocacy Center. Mr. Arcuri is currently of counsel at Hancock Estabrook where he works in government relations, corporate law, white collar crime, and litigation.

Mr. Arcuri earned his B.A. from the University at Albany and his Juris Doctor from New York Law School. He is a contributor to the Politico Blog “The Arena” and acted as a Delegate for the 2008 Democratic Convention in Denver Colorado.

Aron, Nan

President and Executive Director, Alliance for Justice
President and Executive Director, Alliance for Justice Action Campaign

Ms. Aron participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Nan Aron has been a leading voice in public interest law for over 30 years. Ms. Aron founded the Alliance for Justice (AFJ) in 1979 and continues to guide the organization in its mission to advance the cause of justice for all Americans, strengthen the public interest community’s influence on national policy, and foster the next generation of advocates. In 1985, she founded AFJ’s Judicial Selection project, now the country’s premier voice for a fair and independent judiciary and a major player in the often-controversial judicial nominations process.

In addition to increasing judicial advocacy, Ms. Aron has led AFJ to expand its programs to support the participation of nonprofit and foundation staff in public life. Throughout the nation, she is unequivocally recognized for her vast expertise in public interest law, the federal judiciary and citizen participation in public policy.

Bach, Amy

Author, Professor of Political Sience, University of Rochester

Ms. Bach participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Amy Bach is a graduate of Stanford Law School and a member of the New York bar. Ms. Bach has written on law as a freelance journalist for The Nation, The American Lawyer, and New York magazine, among other publications. For her recently published book, Ordinary Injustice: How America Holds Court, Ms. Bach received a Soros Media Fellowship, a special J. Anthony Lukas citation, and a Radcliffe Fellowship. She was also a Knight Foundation Journalism Fellow and Yale Law School. Ms. Bach lives in Rochester, New York, and she teaches a course in American politics called “Courts, Community, and Injustice” at University of Rochester.

Barbash, Fred

Staff Writer and Editor, Continuous News Desk, The Washington Post

Mr. Barbash participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Fred Barbash is a veteran Washington Post writer and editor. Mr. Barbash was the Post’s Supreme Court correspondent from 1980 to 1986, and currently writes about the Court, among other subjects, for washingtonpost.com, where he also writes a blog on Supreme Court nominations. He has served as chief of the Post’s London Bureau, National Editor, Business Editor and columnist. Mr. Barbash is he author of three books, including a popular history of the constitutional convention of 1787.

Bell, Tom W.

Professor of Law, Chapman University School of Law

Professor Bell participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Bell joined the faculty of Chapman University School of Law in 1998, where he now teaches as a professor. He specializes in high-tech legal issues and has written a variety of papers on intellectual property and Internet law. He received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1993, where he served both as a member of the University of Chicago Law Review and as articles editor and co-founder of the University of Chicago Legal Roundtable. After graduating from law school, Professor Bell joined the Silicon Valley law firm of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. He entered teaching in 1995, when he became an assistant professor of law in the Program in Law and Technology at the University of Dayton School of Law. During a year-long leave of absence from that school, and just prior to joining the Chapman faculty, he served as Director of Telecommunications and Technology Studies at the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. In addition to writing a steady stream of scholarly works, Professor Bell has appeared on or been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, CNN, The Los Angeles Times, and many other news sources.

Blinkoff, Sharon A.

Of Counsel, Venable, LLP

Ms. Blinkoff participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Sharon Blinkoff advises clients in the consumer products, cosmetics, pharmaceutical and other industries on regulatory matters involving the Federal Trade Commission, Food and Drug Administration, and industry regulatory bodies such as the National Advertising Board. In addition to advising clients on regulatory matters, Ms. Blinkoff frequently represents her clients in patent, trademark and other intellectual property disputes. Whether representing clients in regulatory or intellectual property issues, Ms. Blinkoff leverages three decades of technical and legal experience to deliver outcomes that enable her clients to accomplish their business objectives. For more than three decades, she has helped her clients successfully navigate the regulatory maze, bring their products to market, protect their intellectual property, and achieve positive business results. Ms. Blinkoff’s undergraduate education in biomedical engineering gives her the technical background to understand the science underlying her clients’ patent and intellectual property issues. Her education includes:  B.S. Bio-Medicinal Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; J.D., New England School of Law; and L.L.M., New York University School of Law. Ms. Blinkoff’s Bar admissions include Connecticut, District of Columbia, New York, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Bowen, Dr. Shannon

Professor, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University

Dr. Bowen participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Bowen is Associate Professor at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications in the Public Relations Department. Her research interests include communication and media ethics, public relations ethics and theory, organizational communication, the strategic management of issues in the pharmaceutical industry, and the ethical decisions by media members surrounding representations of acts of terrorism. Dr. Bowen teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in public relations theory, public relations ethics, and strategic issues management. Dr. Bowen is primarily a Kantian scholar, applying deontological (duty-based) moral philosophy to the communication process in various contexts of media, public, and corporate communication. Her work won the 2000-2002 ICA Public Relations Division Outstanding Dissertation Award. She is the author of numerous journal articles, book chapters, and textbook chapters in Effective Public Relations and other books. She was editorial adviser to the Sage Encyclopedia of Public Relations, and was the principal investigator on a grant sponsored by the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) Research Foundation to study communication ethics, resulting in the 2006 publication “The Business of Truth: A Guide to Ethical Communication.” Dr. Bowen received her Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in Communication and Mass Communication. She received her M.A. from the University of South Carolina in Journalism and Mass Communications and a B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Journalism and Sociology.

Brandenburg, Bert

Executive Director, Justice at Stake Campaign

Mr. Brandenburg participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Bert Brandenburg is the Executive Director of Justice at Stake. Mr. Brandenberg was the Justice Department’s Director of Public Affairs and chief spokesperson under Attorney General Janet Reno. He served in policy and communications positions for the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, the National Performance Review, the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign and presidential transition team, Congressman Edward Feighan, and the Progressive Policy Institute. He was Vice President of International Programs for the Santéch Institute, and served as an observer during the 1990 Pakistan national elections. Mr. Brandenburg serves on the National Ad Hoc Advisory Committee on Judicial Campaign Conduct and the Coalition Alliance of the American Bar Association’s Coalition for Justice. He holds a J.D. and B.A. from the University of Virginia.

Bravin, Jess

Supreme Court Reporter, The Wall Street Journal

Mr. Bravin participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jess Bravin covers the Supreme Court for The Wall Street Journal, where he previously served as United Nations correspondent and editor of the weekly WSJ/California. Mr. Bravin received the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award for  coverage of law and terrorism after 9/11 and the U.N. Correspondents Association’s Elizabeth Neuffer Memorial Prize for reporting on the International Criminal Court.

Mr. Bravin was educated at Harvard and Berkeley, and is a regent emeritus of the University of California. He is a contributor to books including Crimes of War 2.0 and Violence in America: An Encyclopedia, and the author of Squeaky: The Life and Times of Lynette Alice Fromme. Bravin’s latest book, The Terror Courts (Yale University Press), is based on a decade of reporting on military commissions prosecutions at Guantanamo Bay.

Brigham, John

Professor of Political Science, University of Massachusetts

Professor Brigham participated in Reinforcing Federal Law: The Designer Courthouses In Massachusetts and their Meaning for the First Circuit. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Brigham teaches Constitutional Law in the political science department at University of Massachusetts-Amherst. His book Material Law: A Jurisprudence of What’s Real was published in 2009 and discusses the places where law and material life intersect, including trends in courthouse architecture.

Brinkema, Leonie

Judge, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia

Judge Brinkema participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Brinkema received her B.A. from Douglass College and undertook graduate studies in philosophy at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and New York University. She earned her M.L.S. at Rutgers University in 1970 and her J.D. at Cornell Law School in 1976.

Judge Brinkema worked in the United States Department of Justice Criminal Division’s public integrity section from 1976 to 1977 and from 1983 to 1984. She also worked at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of Virginia from 1977 to 1983. From 1984 to 1985, she worked as a solo practitioner. In 1985, Judge Brinkema became a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Eastern District of Virginia, where she served until 1993. In 1993, President Bill Clinton nominated her for a seat on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginian and she took her post in October 1993.

Judge Brinkema presided over the case of 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui. As she sentenced Moussaoui to life in a super-max prison, she told him he would “die with a whimper.” In April 2009, Judge Brinkema weighed in on the question of whether Guantanamo captives could be prosecuted in the civilian justice system.

Buckel, Thomas

County Legislator, Onondaga County, New York
Partner, Hancock Estabrook, LLP

Mr. Buckel participated in the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Thomas Buckel is a partner at Hancock Estabrook, LLP, and has more than 25 years of experience trying complex commercial cases to courts and juries, consistently receiving favorable judgments, verdicts, and appellate decisions. Mr. Buckel has experience prosecuting and defending cutting-edge, complex, commercial and business lawsuits, including antitrust and competition claims, and has consistently won favorable decisions in complex banking and financial actions. Mr. Buckel has also conducted numerous arbitrations and other alternative dispute resolution proceedings, both as an advocate and as a party selected arbitrator. His extensive experience as an arbitrator, elected Onondaga County Legislator and community leader has strengthened his effectiveness as an advocate before judges and juries, and as a problem solver helping clients find innovative, economical resolutions of their business disputes.

Burman, Leonard

Daniel Patrick Moynihan Professor of Public Affairs, Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse University

Professor Burman participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Burman is the Daniel Patrick Moynihan Professor of Public Affairs at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University, an affiliated scholar at the Urban Institute, research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and senior research associate at Syracuse University’s Center for Policy Research. Previously, he was the director and co-founder of the Tax Policy Center, a joint project of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution. He has held high-level positions in both the executive and legislative branches, serving as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax Analysis at the Treasury from 1998 to 2000, and as Senior Analyst at the Congressional Budget Office. He is the president of the National Tax Association.

Professor Burman is the author of The Labyrinth of Capital Gains Tax Policy: A Guide for the Perplexed, and co-editor of the Taxing Capital Income and Using Taxes to Reform Health Insurance, as well as author of numerous articles, studies, and reports. His recent research has examined U.S. federal budget dynamics, the individual alternative minimum tax, the changing role of taxation in social policy, and tax incentives for savings, retirement, and health insurance. ProfessorBurman holds a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota and a B.A. from Wesleyan University.

Bybee, Keith

Associate Professor of Law, Associate Professor of Political Science, Syracuse University College of Law
Paul E. and Hon. Joanne F. Alper Professor of Judiciary Studies, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Bybee participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges, and “Law, Courtesy, Hypocrisy: A conversation on “All Judges Are Political – Except When They Are Not…”  Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Keith J. Bybee is the Paul E. and Hon. Joanne F. Alper ’72 Judiciary Studies Professor at the College of Law. Professor Bybee also holds a tenured appointment in political science at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. He is President of the Association for the Study of Law, Culture, and the Humanities. He also edits the subject matter journal “Law, Politics, and the Media” published by SSRN.com and the book series Law, Politics, and the Media published by Stanford University Press.

Professor Bybee’s teaching interests include law and courts, the politics of race and ethnicity, LGBT rights, American politics, and political philosophy. His articles have appeared in a number of academic journals. He is author of Mistaken Identity: The Supreme Court and the Politics of Minority Representation (Princeton University Press, 1998; second printing, 2002), an examination of the theories of political identity at stake in the debate over race-conscious redistricting. He is also editor of Bench Press: The Collision of Courts, Politics, and the Media (Stanford University Press, 2007), a collection of essays on the current state of judicial independence written by legal scholars, sitting judges, and working journalists. His current book manuscript, Acceptable Hypocrisies: Common Courtesy and the Rule of Law, is under contract with Stanford University Press.

He received his A.B. in Politics from Princeton University and his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego. Before he began teaching at Syracuse University in 2002, he was a faculty member in the Department of Government at Harvard University.

Byrnes, Tim

Panelist, “The Ivory Tower Half Hour”
Professor of Political Science, Colgate University

Professor Byrnes participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Tim Byrnes is a Professor of Political Science at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York. Professor Byrnes’ scholarship focuses mostly on the political role of religious institutions in democratic politics, and his books include, among others,  “Catholic Bishops in American Politics,” “Religion in an Expanding Europe,” and most recently, “Reverse Mission: Transnational Religious Communities and the Making of US Foreign Policy.”

Canellos, Peter

Editorial Page Editor, The Boston Globe

Mr. Canellos participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Peter Canellos was named editor of the Editorial Page in 2009. The former Washington bureau chief has authored the “National Perspective” column since 2003. Mr. Canellos is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia Law School.

Cantor, Nancy

Chancellor, Syracuse University

Chancellor Cantor participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Cantor is the 11th Chancellor and President of Syracuse University, as well as Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Women’s Studies in the College of Arts and Sciences. A native New Yorker, Dr. Cantor came to Syracuse from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she was chancellor. She has held a variety of administrative positions encompassing all aspects of a research university–from chair of the department of psychology at Princeton to dean of the graduate school and then provost and executive vice president for academic affairs at the University of Michigan. She received her A.B. in 1974 from Sarah Lawrence College and her Ph.D. in psychology in 1978 from Stanford University. Dr. Cantor is recognized for her scholarly contributions to the understanding of how individuals perceive and think about their social worlds, pursue personal goals, and how they regulate their behavior to adapt to life’s most challenging social environments. She is co-author or co-editor of three books and author or co-author of some 90 book chapters and journal articles. She has been an advocate for racial justice and for diversity in higher education, and she has written and lectured widely on these subjects. At the University of Michigan she was closely involved in the university’s defense of affirmative action in the cases Grutter and Gratz, decided by the Supreme Court in 2003. Dr. Cantor has also lectured and written extensively on liberal education and the creative campus.

Carr, Donald

Associate Professor, College of Visual and Performing Arts, Syracuse University

Professor Carr participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Carr is the program coordinator for the Industrial and Interactive Design program within the College of Visual and Performing Arts. He is a principal of Carr and Lamb Design, an interdisciplinary design firm that works with clients such as Motorola, K2 Skis, Kimberly Clark, Crate & Barrel and DesignTex. Prior to his tenure at Syracuse University, Professor Carr worked as a corporate designer for AT&T and NCR from which he received numerous patents. He also holds patents for sports equipment from his work as an independent designer. Professor Carr received a BFA from Rochester Institute of Technology and a MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art.

Charles, Midwin

Midwin Charles & Associates, LLC

Ms. Charles participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series.  Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Midwin Charles is a New York-based lawyer who appears as a regular guest commentator for the Nancy Grace Show and Showbiz Tonight on CNN Headline News, TRU TV’s (formerly Court TV) Open Court, Best Defense, and Courtside. She also provides commentary for America’s Nightly Scorecard and Happy Hour on the FOX Business Network and is a frequent contributor to The Huffington Post. Ms. Charles is the founding member of Midwin Charles & Associates, LLC, a law firm that services clients in the areas of criminal law, general corporate and litigation. Active in legal, social, and community affairs, Ms. Charles is a member of Women in Entertainment Empowerment Network (WEEN), the Dean’s Diversity Council for the American University Washington College of Law, and the Marketing Committee for Syracuse University. As an expert public speaker, she has covered topics ranging from careers in law and legal journalism to hot button news issues for various organizations, and will be a guest lecturer at the Institute for the Study of the Judiciary, Politics, and the Media (IJPM) at Syracuse University in Spring 2009. Ms. Charles holds a B.A. from Syracuse University and a J.D. from the American University, Washington College of Law, where she was an Articles Editor for the American University Law Review. Following law school, she clerked for U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit Judge Eric L. Clay and as the A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr. Research Fellow in Social Justice at Harvard Law School under the supervision of Charles J. Ogletree, Jr. She is admitted to the New York State Bar and the Supreme Court of the United States.

Chhablani, Sanjay

Assistant Professor of Law, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Chhablani participated in Lacrosse Justice: Gender, Race, and Fairness in the Duke Lacrosse Legal Saga. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Chhablani began his legal career as a Litigation Associate at a private law firm where, in addition to litigating commercial disputes, he represented, pro bono, persons incarcerated on Illinois’ death row. After receiving an ABA Death Penalty Representation Project Fellowship, Professor Chhablani joined the Southern Center for Human Rights. During the past several years, he has represented indigent persons on death row in Alabama and Georgia on direct appeal and in state and federal post-conviction proceedings. Professor Chhablani is a member of the Illinois, Georgia and Alabama state bars and teaches courses in criminal law, criminal procedure, capital punishment and evidence. Professor Chhablani earned his B.A. from the University of Chicago and his J.D. from Yale Law School.

Collins, Bruce

Corporate Vice President and General Counsel, C-SPAN

Mr. Collins participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Collins joined C-SPAN part-time in 1980 and is currently corporate vice-president and general counsel for C-SPAN. He writes and blogs on many issues related to the law, media, and politics.

Crawford Greenburg, Jan

News Correspondent, ABC News

Ms. Greenburg participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jan Crawford Greenburg is an ABC News Correspondent based in Washington, D.C. where she covers the Supreme Court and provides legal analysis for all ABC News broadcasts. Prior to joining ABC, Ms. Greenburg was the national legal affairs reporter for The Chicago Tribune, where she covered the Supreme Court and national legal issues, including judicial appointments and confirmation battles. Ms. Greenburg joined the Tribune in 1987 and began covering legal affairs in 1993 after her graduation from the University of Chicago Law School. She won the Tribune’stop reporting award in 2001, as part of a team of reporters who covered the 2000 presidential election and the subsequent legal battles over the White House. In 1996, she returned to Alabama, where she grew up on a cattle farm, to write a 13-part series on the South, a generation after the civil rights movement. Again, Ms. Greenburg won the Tribune’s top reporting award for her work. Ms. Greenburg graduated from the University of Alabama in 1987, has taught journalism at American University, and frequently speaks about the Court to universities, law schools, legal organizations, and civic groups across the country. Ms. Greenburg is a member of the New York bar.

Denniston, Lyle

Reporter, SCOTUSblog

Mr. Denniston participated in The Last Umpires? The News Media, the ABA, and Other Independent Voices in the Federal Judicial Confirmation Process, and The Dynamism and Activism of the Roberts Court. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Mr. Denniston is now in his 58th year as a journalist. This also is his 48th year of covering the Supreme Court. He has covered one of every four Justices ever to sit on the Court. Mr. Denniston retired from The Baltimore Sun in February 2001, after covering the Court for the Sun for 19 years. He then covered the Court for The Boston Globe for three years. Previously, he covered the Court for The Washington Star and The Wall Street Journal. Now, his main journalistic activity is covering the Court for an Internet-based clearing house of information about the Supreme Court’s work — the Web log known as “SCOTUSblog.” He also reports on the Court for Radio Station WBUR, an NPR affiliate in Boston. For four years, through the fall semester of 2001, Mr. Denniston taught a course in American constitutional history in the Washington program of Penn State University. He is currently an adjunct professor of law for the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover; he received an honorary doctor of laws degree from that Law School in 2002. In addition to his reporting duties, Mr. Denniston is active in free-lance writing, and is the author of a standard manual, used in newsrooms and in academic journalism throughout the nation, titled The Reporter and The Law: Techniques of Covering the Courts.

Devine, Tom

Legal Director, Government Accountability Project

Mr. Devine participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Tom Devine is the Legal Director of the Government Accountability Project, the nation’s leading whistleblower protection and advocacy organization. Mr. Devine has assisted over 5,000 whistleblowers in defending themselves against retaliation and in making a difference, such as shuttering accident-prone nuclear power plants, checkmating repeated industry ploys to deregulate government meat inspection, and blocking the next generation of the bloated porous “StarWars” missile defense systems. He has been a leader in the campaigns to pass or defend 20 major national or international whistleblower laws, including every one enacted over the last two decades. These include the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 for federal employees; seven breakthrough laws since 2002 creating the right to jury trials for corporate whistleblowers; and new U.N., World Bank, and African Development Bank policies legalizing public freedom of expression for their own whistleblowers.

Mr. Devine has served as “Ambassador of Whistleblowing” in over a dozen nations on trips sponsored by the U.S. State Department. He has authored or co-authored numerous books, including The Corporate Whistleblowers’ Survival Guide: A Handbook for Committing the Truth, law review articles, and newspaper op-eds, and is a frequent expert commentator on television and radio talk shows. He is the recipient of the “Hugh Hefner First Amendment Award” and the “Defender of the Constitution Award” bestowed by the Fund for Constitutional Government. In 2006, he was inducted into the Freedom of Information Act Hall of Fame.

Dickinson, Matthew

Professor of Political Science, Middlebury College

Professor Dickinson participated in Bloggers, Pundits, and Journalists: Assessing Coverage of the 2008 Presidential Campaign. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Dickinson has been a professor of political science at Middlebury College since 2000. His teaching interests are concentrated in American politics, the presidency, and the politics of Congress. Recent publications include “Presidents, Responsiveness and Competence: Revisiting the ‘Golden Age’ at the Bureau of Budget” and “The President and Congress.” Professor Dickinson earned his undergraduate degree from Boston College and his master’s and doctorate from Harvard University.  Professor Dickinson also operates the blog “Presidential Power“, which is targeted to “students who may be interested in learning more about presidential politics.”

Dineen King, Carolyn

Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

Judge King participated in Are Federal Judges Political: Views from the Academy, the Bench, and the Press. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge King is a native of Syracuse. She graduated from Smith College summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa in 1959, and from Yale Law School in 1962. Following her graduation from law school, Judge King moved to Houston where she was engaged in the private practice of law until 1979, focusing primarily on corporate and federal securities law. On July 13, 1979 she was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit by President Jimmy Carter, and she continues to serve on that court. Judge King was the Chief Judge of the Fifth Circuit from January 16, 1999 through January 15, 2006. Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist appointed Judge King to be a member of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States from 2000 to 2005 and to chair the committee from October 2002 through September 2005. Judge King has been a member of the Council of the American Law Institute since 1991, and was an adviser to the Products Liability Restatement and to the Transnational Insolvency Project.

Dolak, Lisa A.

Angela S. Cooney Professor of Law, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Dolak participated in The Last Umpires? The News Media, the ABA, and Other Independent Voices in the Federal Judicial Confirmation Process, Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy, and the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Professor Dolak teaches courses on patent law, Internet law, and practice and procedure in the federal courts, and serves as Associate Director of the Center on Property, Citizenship, and Social Entrepreneurism and Associate Director of the Syracuse University Institute for the Study of the Judiciary, Politics, and the Media. In her professional consulting practice, she serves as an expert and early neutral evaluator/mediator in patent litigation matters, prepares patent opinion letters, and advises on litigation matters and patent reexamination and interference proceedings. During a sabbatical leave from Syracuse University, she served as law clerk to the Hon. Paul F. Michel, (now-) Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. She has served since January 2005 as a member of the Federal Circuit’s Advisory Council. Prior to attending law school, Professor Dolak worked for several years as a synthetic organic chemist in pharmaceutical research aimed at the development of new drugs at Bristol-Myers Company and Ayerst Laboratories Research, Inc. Professor Dolak received her Bachelor of Science in chemistry from Duquesne University and her Juris Doctor, summa cum laude, from the Syracuse University College of Law. She is admitted to practice in New York and before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Professor Dolak’s current research centers on media coverage of intellectual property rights. Her other research interests include issues at the intersections of patent law and judicial procedure and patent law and ethics.

Dorf, Michael

Robert S. Stevens Professor of Law, Cornell University Law School

Professor Dorf participated in The Aspirational Constitution. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Dorf is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School. After law school, Professor Dorf served as a law clerk for Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the Supreme Court of the United States. Professor Dorf is the author of the blog “Dorf on Law.” His writings have also appeared in The New York Times and he has been interviewed on National Public Radio.

Epstein, Lee

Beatrice Kuhn Professor of Law, Northwestern University School of Law

Professor Epstein participated in The Last Umpires? The News Media, the ABA, and Other Independent Voices in the Federal Judicial Confirmation Process. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Epstein visited Northwestern University School of Law as the Jack N. Pritzker Distinguished Visiting Professor for Fall 2005, and has joined the faculty as the Beatrice Kuhn Professor of Law. She is also a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Academy of Political and Social Science. A recipient of ten grants from the National Science Foundation for her work on judicial politics, Professor Epstein has also authored, co-authored, or edited over seventy articles and essays, as well as fourteen books. She is currently working with the papers of Justice Harry Blackmun for a book on agenda setting on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Feldman, Jonathan

Magistrate Judge, United States District Court for the Western District of New York

Judge Feldman participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Feldman is a 1978 graduate of Cornell University and he received his J.D.summa cum laude from Syracuse University College of Law in 1981. Judge Feldman began his legal career at Harris Beach in Rochester and then served as a law clerk to the Honorable Michael A. Telesca, U.S. District Court Judge for the Western District of New York. Judge Feldman then joined the United States Attorney’s Office in 1983. In 1987, Judge Feldman opened his own firm with Frank P. Geraci, Jr., and their practice focused on criminal and civil litigation. In 1988, as an adjunct to private practice, Judge Feldman formed United States Arbitration and Mediation of Upstate New York, one of the first private alternative dispute resolution providers in western New York.

In 1992, Judge Feldman was appointed by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals as the first Federal Public Defender for the Western District of New York, and served in that position until 1995, when he was appointed United States Magistrate Judge for the Western District, sitting in Rochester. In 1999, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist appointed Judge Feldman to the Federal Judicial Center’s Magistrate Judge Education Committee which is charged with developing and implementing legal education programs for new and sitting federal Magistrate Judges. Judge Feldman is a frequent lecturer at FJC programs on topics relating to federal criminal law and procedure.

Fitzpatrick, William

District Attorney, Onondaga County

Mr. Fitzpatrick participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Flood, Mary

Legal Reporter, The Houston Chronicle

Ms. Flood participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mary Flood is a lawyer and a legal reporter for The Houston Chronicle, where she covered Enron for more than four years. Ms. Flood previously worked as a legal reporter for The Wall Street Journal’s Texas Journal. A cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School, Ms. Flood practiced law for three years in Washington, D.C. and Houston. She has taught Media Law and Ethics at University of Houston and has won more than 50 awards for excellence in reporting and writing.

Freeman, Robert

Executive Director, Committee on Open Government, New York Department of State

Mr. Freeman participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event

Robert J. Freeman is the Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government with the New York Department of State. Before becoming executive director of the Committee in 1976, Mr. Freeman had been its counsel. He received his law degree from New York University and a B.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Mr. Freeman has spoken before numerous government related organizations, bar associations, media groups, and has lectured at various colleges and universities. He has also discussed open government laws and concepts in Canada, the far east, Latin America, and eastern Europe. In 1982, the New York State Society of Newspaper Editors presented Mr. Freeman with its Friend of the Free Press Award, and, in 1992, he was given the First Amendment award by the New York Press Association. The New York City Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, the Deadline Club, presented him with its First Amendment Award in 1994. He was presented with the Governor Alfred E. Smith Award by the Empire State Capital Area Chapter of the American Society for Public Administration in 1996 for outstanding individual service and initiative exemplifying superior management and administration, and was made a Fellow of the State Academy for Public Administration. In 1999, Mr. Freeman was cited in Empire State Report, New York’s “Independent Magazine of Politics, Policy and the Business of Government,” as one of “25 Empire State Residents” during the past 25 years “whose public service, determination, idealism or gut instincts resulted in sweeping improvements in the lives of fellow New Yorkers.” He was given the Distinguished Public Service Award by the Nelson A. Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy at the State University of New York at Albany in 2000. Most recently, Mr. Freeman was honored by the New York State Bar Association’s Committee on Attorneys in Public Service with the 2005 Award for Excellence in Public Service. He is currently service as adjunct professor at the Albany Law School and teaches the only course in an American law school on public access to government information.

French, Dan

Former United States Attorney, Northern District of New York

Mr. French participated in Jail for Journalists: Freedom of the Press, Confidential Sources, and the Demands of Criminal Justice. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. French is a founding partner of French Alcott, PLLC, a Syracuse, New York law firm. His practice includes complex civil litigation and criminal defense, along with a federal relations practice involving lobbying on behalf of clients before federal and state representatives and agencies. Before forming French Alcott, Mr. French served as United States Attorney for the Northern District of New York where he was the chief federal law enforcement officer for 32 of New York’s 62 counties and serving over 3.5 million state residents. He oversaw the work of 39 Assistant United States Attorneys located in Syracuse, Albany, and Binghamton. Previously, Mr. French served as an Assistant United States Attorney assigned to the criminal division in Syracuse, New York and as a confidential Law Clerk for then United States District Court Judge Rosemary S. Pooler. In addition, he served as Acting Deputy Staff Director to the United States Senate Committee on Finance, Executive Assistant to United States Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and as a Professional Staff Member to the United States Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. He represents Adam Levine, a former White House Deputy Press Secretary who was called to testify before Special Prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald’s grand jury inquiry into the leak of Valery Plame’s name. He also advocates on behalf of Syracuse University before the United States Congress and federal and state agencies.

Geyh, Charles

Professor of Law and Harry T. Ice Faculty Fellow, Indiana University School of Law, Bloomington

Professor Geyh participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, “Law, Courtesy, Hypocrisy: A conversation on “All Judges Are Political – Except When They Are Not…”, and Is the Best Defense a Good Offense? The Ethics and Politics of Allowing Judges to Advocate Controversial Views. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Professor Geyh joined the Indiana faculty in 1998, bringing to the classroom a rich diversity of experience in both scholarship and public service. In addition to his teaching and scholarship, he has served as director of the American Judicature Society’s Center for Judicial Independence, reporter to American Bar Association commissions on judicial independence and (more recently) the public financing of judicial elections, consultant to the National Commission on judicial Discipline and Removal, legislative liaison to the Federal Courts Study Committee, and a member of the American Law Institute. The author of numerous articles and book chapters, Professor Geyh in his recent scholarship has explored issues relating to judicial administration, independence, and accountability. His courses include Civil Procedure, Courts and Congress, the Legal Profession, and Federal Courts.

Gillers, Stephen

Emily Kempin Professor of Law, New York University School of Law

Professor Gillers participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Gillers has been Professor of Law at the New York University School of Law since 1978. His research and writing focuses on the regulation of the legal profession. His courses include Regulation of Lawyers, Evidence, and Law and Literature. Professor Gillers has written widely on legal and judicial ethics in law reviews and the legal popular press. He has taught legal ethics as a visitor at other law schools and has spoken on lawyer regulatory issues at federal and state judicial conferences, law firms and general counsel’s offices, ABA conventions, state bar meetings nationwide, before Congress, and in law school lectureships. Professor Gillers is the author of Regulation of Lawyers: Problems of Law and Ethics, a widely used law school casebook first published in 1985 and now in its seventh edition. He is currently chair of the ABA’s Joint Committee on Lawyer Regulation. Following a clerkship with Chief Judge Gus J. Solomon in Federal District Court in Portland, Oregon, Professor Gillers practiced law for nine years in New York City.

Goldstein, Tom

Professor and former Dean, Graduate School of Journalism, University of California, Berkeley
Former Dean, Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University

Mr. Goldstein participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Tom Goldstein has been a teacher, administrator and journalist on both coasts. He served as dean of the University of California at Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism from 1988 to 1996, and dean of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism from 1997 to 2002. He has also taught at New York University, the University of Florida and the Kennedy School at Harvard. A graduate of Yale College, Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and Columbia Law School, Mr. Goldstein was the founding editor of Juris Doctor, a magazine for young lawyers. He worked as a reporter at the Buffalo Evening News, Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal and Newsday. From 1973 to 1979, he covered legal affairs for the metropolitan, business and national desk of The New York Times. From 1980 to 1982, Mr. Goldstein served as press secretary for Mayor Edward I. Koch. After leaving the mayor’s staff, he began to freelance, a career he still pursues. Mr. Goldstein is the author of The News at Any Cost, the editor of Killing the Messenger, and co-author of The Lawyer’s Guide to Writing Well. He is the West Coast editor of the Columbia Journalism Review.

Goodman, Amy

Author, Host, Democracy Now!

Ms. Goodman participated in Independent Media: Speaking Up For Democracy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

The Independent of London called Amy Goodman and Democracy Now! “an inspiration”; PULSE named her one of the 20 Top Global Media Figures of 2009. Ms. Goodman’s latest book, Breaking the Sound Barrier, proves the power of independent journalism in the struggle for a better world. She co-authored the first three bestsellers with her brother, journalist David Goodman: Standing Up to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times (2008), Static: Government Liars, Media Cheerleaders, and the People Who Fight Back (2006) and The Exception to the Rulers: Exposing Oily Politicians, War Profiteers, and the Media That Love Them(2004). She writes a weekly column (also produced as an audio podcast) syndicated by King Features, for which she was recognized in 2007 with the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Reporting.

Ms. Goodman has received the American Women in Radio and Television Gracie Award; the Paley Center for Media’s She’s Made it Award; and the Puffin/Nation Prize for Creative Citizenship. Her reporting on East Timor and Nigeria has won numerous awards, including the George Polk Award, Robert F. Kennedy Prize for International Reporting, and the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award. She has also received awards from the Associated Press, United Press International, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and the Project Censored. Ms. Goodman received the first ever Communication for Peace Award from the World Association for Christian Communication. She was also honored by the National Council of Teachers of English with the George Orwell Award for Distinguished Contribution to Honesty and Clarity in Public Language.

Gordon, Gregg

President and CEO, Social Science Research Network

Mr. Gordon participated in Critical Mass is Critical: Building Authority in a Changing World. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Gregg Gordon has been the president and CEO of the Social Science Research Network (SSRN) since 2005. SSRN is an online resource allowing access to a wide array of scholarly research and working papers.

Graves, Jr., James E.

Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

Judge Graves participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, and the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Judge Graves is a distinguished and experienced Mississippi jurist, who was an attorney in private practice and public service before taking the bench. Judge Graves was confirmed to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on February 14, 2011. The only African-American serving on the Mississippi Supreme Court at the time of is appointment to the Fifth Circuit, Judge Graves takes a keen interest in the administration of his state’s court system, and has been active in national, state and local bar associations.

Judge Graves has served as a judge in the Mississippi court system since 1991, sitting for ten years on the Hinds County Circuit Court and, since 2001, on Mississippi’s highest court first as an Associate Justice and currently as a Presiding Justice. Judge Graves began his legal career in 1980 as a staff attorney at Central Mississippi Legal Services. At that time he also began his 17 years of service as an Adjunct Professor at Jackson State University, teaching in the Departments of Mass Communications, Political Science, and Public Policy & Administration. After three years at Legal Services, Judge Graves entered private practice, focusing primarily on civil matters in state and federal court. From 1986 to 1990, he joined the Office of the Mississippi Attorney General, working as a Special Assistant Attorney General in the Human Services and Health Law divisions. He then served in the Mississippi Department of Human Services as the Director of the Division of Child Support Enforcement until his appointment to the Hinds County Circuit Court in 1991.

In addition to his legal work and teaching career, Judge Graves has been very active in local and national bar associations. Judge Graves is currently a Fellow of the Mississippi State Bar, and has served on a variety of committees of the National Conference of State Trial Judges, working on issues of concern common to state judges. He also serves his state’s court system as the current Chair of the Mississippi Supreme Court Rules Committee on Criminal Practice and Procedure. He formerly served as Chair of the Mississippi Supreme Court Committee on Administrative and Related Matters, the Supreme Court’s Emergency Preparedness Committee, and Public Defender’s Task Force, among others.

A Mississippi native, Judge Graves received his B.A. from Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi in 1975, and went on to earn his J.D. from Syracuse University in 1980, and a Masters in Public Administration from Syracuse in 1981.

Greene, Jonathan

Writer, Law and Order SVU

Mr. Greene participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jonathan Greene is a writer and co-executive producer for the NBC television series “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” on which he just completed his tenth season. Mr. Greene came to dramatic television after a career in broadcast journalism spanning 15 years, beginning as a radio reporter and moving to television as a news producer and executive in stations spanning Upstate New York, New York City, Florida, New England, North Carolina and Ohio. He last served as writer, producer, and director of documentaries at Court TV (now TruTV). His last documentary, “The Interrogation of Michael Crowe,” earned him and the network a DuPont-Columbia Award. During his tenure at SVU, Mr. Greene’s episodes have contributed to the show’s many honors, including Emmy nominations for lead actors Christopher Meloni and Mariska Hargitay, and a guest-star Emmy win for film icon Leslie Caron. He has been a finalist for the Humanitas Prize and the Edgar Allen Poe Award given by the Mystery Writers of America. In addition, his episodes have won SVU the Golden Psi Award from the America Psychological Association, the Socially Responsible Media Award given by the Physicians for Social Responsibility and three Prism Commendations from the Entertainment Industries Council. Mr. Greene holds a Bachelor’s degree in political science and a Master’s degree in communications from Syracuse University. He and his family reside in Los Angeles.

Greene, K.J.

Associate Professor of Law, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

Professor Greene participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Greene was recently selected by peers in the San Diego intellectual property bar as one of the Top Ten Intellectual Property (“IP”) attorneys in San Diego County, and has developed a national reputation as an IP scholar. A native New Yorker and a graduate of the Yale Law School, Professor Greene is a tenured faculty member at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, where he teaches Contracts, Intellectual Property, Music Law, and Entertainment Law. He has also served as a visiting professor at both the University of San Diego School of Law, where he taught Entertainment Law and a seminar entitled on the Right of Publicity, and at Hofstra University School of Law in New York. Professor Greene served with honor in a fighter jet squadron of the U.S. Marines and graduated with highest honors from the State University of New York at Old Westbury before attending Yale Law School. Following graduation, Professor Greene completed a judicial clerkship with the Michigan Supreme Court, and was awarded a special certificate for outstanding service. Following his judicial clerkship, Professor Greene practiced corporate litigation at the blue chip New York firm law firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, and entertainment and IP law at Frankfurt, Garbus, Klein and Selz, a leading New York entertainment boutique firm. He has represented clients such as Time-Warner/HBO, film producer Spike Lee, pop singer Bobby Brown, TV star Geraldo Rivera and the ground-breaking rap group Public Enemy. Greene is a leading expert on the subject of blues, jazz and the law. His book chapter entitled “What the Treatment of Black Artists Can Teach About Copyright Law” recently appeared in Intellectual Property and Information wealth: Issues and Practices in the Digital Age. Another article entitled “Using Multi-Media Materials to Teach Entertainment Law” is forthcoming for publication in the fall of 2007. Professor Greene is a member of the American Intellectual Property Law Association’s (“AIPLA”) Trademark Litigation Committee, and speaks nationally and internationally on IP and entertainment law-related topics before groups such as Practicing Law Institute’s s (“PLI”) seminar “Counseling Clients in the Entertainment Industry”, the ABA’s Section on Intellectual Property Law, the Black Entertainment and Sports Lawyers’ Association (“BESLA”), the  Association of  American Law Schools (“AALS”), the Intellectual Property Scholar’s Conference, the San Diego County Bar Association, and the corporate legal departments of hi-tech and entertainment industry companies.

Greer, George W.

Judge, Pinellas-Pasco County Circuit Court

Judge Greer participated in the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Greer is a Circuit Court Judge, Sixth Judicial Circuit, Pinellas County, Florida. He received his B.S. degree from Florida State University and his J.D. degree from the University of Florida. In 1992, Judge Greer was elected to the Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court and re-elected in 1998 and 2004. Since taking office on January 5, 1993, he has served in the Juvenile Division, the Probate and Guardianship Division, the Criminal Law Division and the Family Law Division. Judge Greer achieved national prominence for his decisions in the long-running Terry Schiavo legal saga. At its Law Day Luncheon in April 2005, the Clearwater Bar Association created the George W. Greer Judicial Independence Award. On March 31, 2006, he was awarded the N.Neal Pike Prize by the Boston University School of Law, and was recently named Jurist of the Year by the Southeastern Chapters of the American Board of Trial Advocates.

Grey, Jr., Robert J.

Past President, American Bar Association
Partner, Hunton & Williams LLP

Mr. Grey participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Robert Grey devoted his yearlong term to creating better justice through better juries via the American Jury Initiative. The Jury Initiative was composed of the Commission on the American Jury and the American Jury Project. The Commission was dedicated to educating the public on and reinvigorating the nation’s commitment to jury service. The American Jury Project modernized and consolidated varying sets of juror standards into a single model document that reflects the demands of contemporary trials. This work will continue under the auspices of the new American Jury Project. Additionally, Mr. Grey worked to review, unify and update ABA programs to increase diversity in the legal profession, to advance the ABA’s international rule of law efforts, and to safeguard the profession’s independence. Mr. Grey earned his J.D. from Washington and Lee University in Virginia in 1976, and his B.S. from Virginia Commonwealth University in 1973.

Grimes, Charlotte

Knight Chair for Political Reporting, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University

Ms. Grimes participated in Are Federal Judges Political: Views from the Academy, the Bench, and the Press. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Ms. Grimes was a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for 20 years, 12 of them in its Washington bureau. Her work included covering local and national campaigns and elections, the politics and policy of health care and international trade, the U. S. invasion of Panama and the United Nations during the Persian Gulf war; reconstructing the lives and deaths of five Catholic missionaries killed in Liberia’s civil war; and reporting from Nicaragua, Mexico, China and Japan. Her reporting won national and local awards, and helped change state laws in Missouri to give better care to rape victims, children in foster care and the elderly in boarding homes. Ms. Grimes is a native of Andaluisa, Alabama.

Haggerty, James

President and CEO, The PR Consulting Group, Inc.

Mr. Haggerty participated in the 2009 Law, Politics and the Media Lecture Series, the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series, and the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

James F. Haggerty, President and CEO of The PR Consulting Group, is an attorney with more than 20 years’ experience in marketing, public relations and public affairs. Among the nation’s best-known experts in litigation communications, Mr. Haggerty has also earned a national reputation in environmental issues, professional services marketing, public affairs and crisis management. In addition to advising legal, corporate and nonprofit clients on marketing and communications matters, he has been involved in numerous high-profile legal disputes in recent years —including the largest lawsuit ever filed against the United States government (the Cobell v. Norton Indian Trust class action), the largest employment class action in history (the Home Depot case), the largest single-family Holocaust restitution claim in history (the Wertheim Department Store case), and the largest child custody and support case in history (Duff v. Perelman). He has also led the communications effort in the Jonathan Pollard spy case and the historic Screen Actors Guild labor dispute against the commercial advertising industry. The Washington Post recently called Mr. Haggerty “an expert on media strategies in high-profile cases,” while Ragan’s Media Relations Reports has called him “one of the nation’s foremost experts in Litigation PR.” During his representation of Patricia Duff in her famed child custody case with billionaire Ronald Perelman, the New York Observer noted that his work helped “even up the odds.”

Mr. Haggerty is the author of In The Court Of Public Opinion: Winning Your Case With Public Relations (John Wiley & Sons, 2003),a groundbreaking look at the use of communications and public opinion strategies during lawsuits. One of the top-selling legal hardcovers of 2003, Financial Times called In The Court of Public Opinion “…the perfect handbook for this age…” In The Court of Public Opinion was also positively featured in publications including The Boston Herald, The New York Law Journal, American Lawyer, Law Society Gazette, the Washington Post, The Holmes Report, PR Week and O’Dwyer’s PR Newsletter. Mr. Haggerty holds a B.A. in Political Science and English Literature and Rhetoric from the State University of New York at Binghamton, and studied Law at Fordham University in New York and Stetson University in St. Petersburg, Florida (J.D.). He is admitted to practice in New York and Florida, and is a member of the New York City and New York State Bar Associations, and the Counselors Academy of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). A frequent writer and lecturer on communications issues, Mr. Haggerty’s articles and other writing has appeared in USA Today, The New York Times, The National Law Journal, the New York Law Journal, Law Practice Management and PR Week.

Howe, Amy

Partner, Howe & Russell, P.C.
Editor, SCOTUSblog

Ms. Howe participated in Supreme Decisions: The Roberts’ Court in 2010 and Beyond. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Amy Howe has served as counsel in over two dozen merits cases at the Supreme Court, including matters involving criminal law, the death penalty, the First Amendment, bankruptcy, and the Americans with Disabilities Act. In the 2007 term, Ms. Howe successfully argued on behalf of the petitioner in Greenlaw v. United States, a case involving the authority of a court of appeals to increase criminal sentences in the absence of a government cross-appeal. Ms. Howe is currently is a lecturer in law at Stanford Law School, where she co-teaches the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic and she has co-taught the Supreme Court Litigation class at Harvard Law School.

Ms. Howe has a special interest in the death penalty, international law, and international human right and has consulted on numerous briefs relating to those issues in both the Supreme Court and the lower courts. From 2001 to 2004 she was an adjunct professor teaching international human rights litigation at American University’s Washington College of Law. Prior to joining Howe & Russell, P.C., Ms. Howe was an associate in litigation and international practice at Steptoe & Johnson LLP. She is also the editor of SCOTUSblog and she earned her J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center.

Johnson, Paula

Professor of Law, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Johnson participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Paula Johnson is professor of law at Syracuse University College of Law. Professor Johnson currently serves as co-president of the Society of American Law Teachers (SALT), a national organization of approximately 800 law professors. She received her B.A. from the University of Maryland, College Park; her J.D. from Temple University School of Law; and her LL.M. from Georgetown University Law Center. At Syracuse, she teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, voting rights, professional responsibility, and a seminar on women in the criminal justice system. She also has taught at the University of Arizona, the University of Baltimore, and Northern Illinois University.

Professor Johnson has written and spoken extensively on matters of race, gender and law in academic arenas, the popular press, and community forums. Her writings include the recently published book, Inner Lives: Voices of African American Women in Prison (NYU Press 2003); and book chapter, “A Legal and Qualitative Study of the Relationships between Incarcerated African American Mothers and Their Children, Institute for Policy Research” (Northwestern University 2002). Her law review articles include “Ad-In/Ad-Out: Deciding Victory and Defeat in Affirmative Action Legal Contestations,” 66 Albany Law Review 433 (2003); “Danger in the Diaspora: Law, Culture and Violence Against Women of African Descent in the United States and South Africa,” 1 Univ. Iowa Journal of Gender, Race and Justice 471 (1998); “The Social Construction of Identity in Criminal Cases: Cinema Verité and the Pedagogy of Vincent Chin,” 1 Michigan Journal of Race and Law 347 (1996); “At the Intersection of Injustice: Experiences of African American Women in Crime and Sentencing,” 4 American University Journal of Gender and Law 1 (1995); and “Silence Equals Death: The Response to AIDS within Communities of Color,” University of Illinois Law Review 1075 (1992).

At Syracuse University, Professor Johnson serves on a broad range of College of Law and University committees. She currently serves on the Chancellor’s Search Committee, and has served as co-chair of Sistaprof, an organization of Africana women professors at Syracuse University, and served as co-chair of the S.U. Senate’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered (LGBT) Concerns Committee. Her public service includes membership on the boards of the Hiscock Legal Aid Society, the Center for Community Alternatives, and the Battered Women’s Justice Project National Advisory Committee.

In 2003, Professor Johnson received the Unsung Heroine Award from the Syracuse University Martin Luther King, Jr. Awards Committee, and the Woman of the Year Award from the Syracuse University African American Male Congress.

Johnston, David Cay

Distinguished Visiting Lecturer, Syracuse University College of Law, Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University

Professor Johnston participated in the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

David Cay Johnston is the author of two bestsellers on the tax system, FREE LUNCH in 2008 and PERFECTLY LEGAL, which won the 2004 Investigative Book of the Year award. Professor Johnston’s fourth investigative book will reveal how little-known government rules restrain competition and artificially inflate prices. This summer Portfolio will publish The Fine Print: How Big Business Abuses Plain English to Rob You Blind.

Professor Johnston has been called the “de facto chief tax enforcement officer of the United States.” Congress valued just two of the tax dodges his reporting shut down at $260 billion. Juries convicted eight people, in unrelated trials, whose tax crimes Johnston exposed and each got six years or more behind bars. Johnston received the Pulitzer Prize in 2001 for his exposes in The New York Times of tax inequities and loopholes, one of many awards received during 40 years of investigative reporting at five major newspapers including The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Los Angeles Times. After retiring early from The New York Times in 2008, Johnston became a columnist for Tax Notes and its free website tax.com

Professor Johnston teaches the property, tax and regulatory law of the ancient world at Syracuse University College of Law and Whitman School of Management, is a commentator for NPR and for WXXI; writes for the public policy website remappingdebate.com; is a frequent guest on Countdown with Keith Olbermann and other television programs and lectures from Norway to China on ethics, journalism technique and taxes.

Kaufman, Bert

Senior Advisor, Office of the Secretary, Office of Business Liaison, United States Department of Commerce

Mr. Kaufman participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Kaufman is a Senior Advisor in the Office of U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker. Mr Kaufman also serves as co-Director of the Presidential Ambassadors for Global Entrepreneurship (PAGE) initiative, a public-private partnership between the White House, Commerce Department, State Department, U.S. Agency for International Development, U.S. Small Business Administration, and well-known U.S. entrepreneurs, designed to promote and inspire entrepreneurship in the U.S. and around the world. Prior to joining the Obama Administration in 2013, Mr. Kaufman served as Executive Director at Business Forward, a non-profit organization he co-founded in 2009, which produces national programming and fosters partnerships between business leaders and policymakers, and as Vice President at Portico Policy Advisors, a Washington, D.C.-based policy research firm where he advised auto industry clients and venture-backed start-ups in the food and consumer product sectors. He also helped start and is on the board of Press Pass Mentors, an educational non-profit where journalists from The Washington Post mentor inner-city high school students. Mr. Kaufman served as a law clerk in United States District Court, and worked for CNN in Washington, D.C., and London. While in law school at Syracuse University College of Law, Mr. Kaufman helped start the Institute for the Study of the Judiciary, Politics, and Media (IJPM), a first-of-its-kind interdisciplinary center created to produce scholarship and national programming on the interaction between courts, politics and the press.

Kirst, Sean

Columnist, The Post-Standard

Mr. Kirst participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Kirst is a metropolitan columnist with The Post-Standard, a daily newspaper in Syracuse, New York. Mr. Kirst was hired in 1988, and began writing a column in 1991. Prior to joining The Post-Standard, Mr. Kirst worked for daily newspapers in Dunkirk and Niagara Falls, New York. He also spent two years with City, an alternative weekly in Rochester, New York. Mr. Kirst and his columns have received numerous awards, including the Ernie Pyle Award for human interest writing, the national award of excellence from Sigma Delta Chi, the national award for commentary from Capitolbeat, an organization for journalists who cover state politics, and national Clarion Awards for opinion writing. Mr. Kirst has also been recognized by the American Association of Sunday and Features Editors for his interactive involvement with readers through his blog, and the U.S. Justice Department for sensitivity to victims of violent crime. Mr. Kirst is the author of The Ashes of Lou Gehrig, a collection of baseball essays, and worked with Earl Lloyd on Lloyd’s autobiography, Moonfixer. The England-based Tolkien Society credits Mr. Kirst with proposing the worldwide Tolkien Reading Day that is now held every March, a celebration that always includes a gathering in Central New York.

Koff, Stephen

Washington Bureau Chief, The Plain Dealer

Mr. Koff participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

In 30-plus years in journalism, Stephen Koff has made sense of the complex, exposed corruption, and covered stories ranging from national tragedies to entertainment (which is why when he was assigned to cover the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, another reporter was heard to grumble, “They are sending the freakin’ film critic.”).

A high school dropout, Mr. Koff took a circuitous rout to daily journalism getting a GED and a Bachelor’s degree while earning money playing bass in bar bands, and later earning a Master’s degree. He has been on the staffs of Cincinnati Magazine, The St. Petersburg Evening Independent, The St. Petersburg Times, and The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer. In 1998, he became the Plain Dealer’s Washington bureau chief.

Koo, Gene

Executive Director, iCivics

Mr. Koo participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

As Executive Director, Gene Koo works with iCivics’ staff, Board and supporters to educate and engage a new generation of American citizens. Mr. Koo oversees all organizational activities, with a primary focus on aligning operations and strategy with organizational vision, achieving large-scale adoption, and securing long-term sustainability.

Prior to iCivics, Mr. Koo developed new media strategies to connect nonprofit organizations with their grassroots constituencies. As a Fellow at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society, he brought Web-based innovation into law school classrooms and designed virtual worlds for civic engagement. Mr. Koo also co-founded the nation’s first online skills training program for legal aid attorneys. He holds a J.D. and a B.A. from Harvard.

Kourlis, Rebecca

Director, Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System

Ms. Kourlis participated in the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Rebecca Love Kourlis served Colorado’s courts for nearly two decades: first as a trial court judge and then as a Justice of the Colorado Supreme Court. Justice Kourlis resigned from Colorado’s high court in January 2006 to establish the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System (IAALS) at the University of Denver, where she is Executive Director. Although it is a young organization, the Institute has already achieved recognition as a national voice for civil justice reform.  Recently, IAALS was named the Legal Reform Organization of the Year by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Justice Kourlis earned her B.A. in English from Stanford University and her J.D. from Stanford University Law School.  For more information on IAALS, visit http://www.du.edu/legalinstitute.

Lee-Glauser, Gina

Director, CASE Center, Syracuse University

Dr. Lee-Glauser participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Lee-Glauser is Associate Vice President for Research and Research Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Syracuse University. Her area of expertise include Structural Dynamics and Control; Active and Passive Vibration Control; Learning Control; System Identification. Dr. Lee-Glauser’s educational endeavors consist of the ABET Engineering Accreditation Commission member; Involved in undergraduate engineering curricular reform; Institution-wide interdisciplinary forum facilitator; promotion and support of Underrepresented minority students and Women in STEM. Dr. Lee-Glauser has an overall responsibility of the University’s Office of Technology Transfer and Industrial Development and the CASE Center: support activities such as invention disclosures/protections, market and negotiate license agreement, and joint industrial projects, support incubator tenants, and the CASE Co-Op program. Dr. Lee-Glauser proactively facilitates and nurtures collaborative interactions between University (faculty, post-doctoral, graduate and undergraduate students) and New York industries to accelerate transfer of University knowledge to substantially increasing economic and innovation impact on New York industries.

Lewis, Anthony

Former Columnist, The New York Times

Mr. Lewis participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Anthony Lewis was a columnist for The New York Times from 1969 to 2001. Mr. Lewis has twice won the Pulitzer Prize. In 2001 he was awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal. Mr. Lewis received a B.A. from Harvard College in 1948. From 1948 to 1952, he was a deskman in the Sunday Department of the Times. In 1952, he became a reporter for The Washington Daily News.  In 1955, he won a Pulitzer Prize for national reporting for a series of articles in the News on dismissal of a Navy employee as a security risk. The articles led to the employee’s reinstatement. In 1955, Mr. Lewis joined the Washington Bureau of The New York Times. In 1956-57, he was a Nieman Fellow and spent the academic year studying at the Harvard Law School. On his return to Washington, he covered the Supreme Court, the Justice Department and other legal matters, including the government’s handling of the civil rights movement, for the Times. Mr. Lewis won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Supreme Court in 1963. He became Chief of the Times’ London Bureau in 1964. He began writing his column from London in 1969. Since 1973 he has been located in Boston.

Mr. Lewis is the author of three books: Gideon’s Trumpet, about a landmark Supreme Court case; Portrait of a Decade, about the great changes in American race relations; and Make No Law: The Sullivan Case and the First Amendment. Mr. Lewis was for fifteen years a lecturer on Law at the Harvard Law School, teaching a course on The Constitution and the Press. He has taught at a number of other universities as a visitor. Since 1983 he has held the James Madison Visiting Professorship at Columbia University.

Lichtblau, Eric

Author, Writer, The New York Times

Mr. Lichtblau participated in Bush’s Law: A Conversation with a Pulitzer Prize-winning Author.  Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Lichtblau joined The New York Times in September 2002 as a correspondent covering the Justice Department. Previously, Mr. Lichtblau worked at the Los Angeles Times for 15 years, where he also covered the Justice Department in their Washington bureau from 1999 to 2002. Prior to that, Mr. Lichtblau did stints on the L.A. Times’ investigative team in Los Angeles and covered various law enforcement beats. Mr. Lichtblau was born in Syracuse, N.Y., and graduated from Cornell University in 1987. With fellow New York Times reporter James Risen, Mr. Lichtblau was awarded a 2006 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. He is the author of Bush’s Law: The Remaking of American Justice.

Lippman, Jonathan

Chief Judge, New York State Court of Appeals

Chief Judge Lippman participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Lippman was born and raised in New York City, attending public schools there and receiving his B.A. (Phi Beta Kappa and cum laude) in 1965 and J.D. in 1968, both from New York University.

Judge Lippman’s career in the court system spans four decades, beginning as an entry level court attorney in the Supreme Court and taking him all the way to the highest judicial seat in the state of New York. He spent seven years as the Principal Court Attorney for the Supreme Court of New York and was named the Chief Clerk and Executive Officer in 1983, a position that he held for six years. In 1989, Judge Lippman was appointed Deputy Chief Administrator for Management and, in 1995, he was appointed by then Governor George Pataki as Judge of the New York Court of Claims and reappointed by the Governor to a full nine year term in 1998.

In May 2007, Governor Eliot Spitzer appointed Judge Lippman to serve as the Presiding Justice of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court, First Department, one of the largest and most influential appellate courts in the country. In February 2009, Governor Patterson appointed Judge Lippman  to serve as the Chief Judge of the State and Chief Judge of the Court of Appeals.

Chief Judge Lippman has dedicated himself to fostering a justice system that is independent, open, accountable and responsive to the people it serves. As the longest tenure he played a central role in many reforms in New York’s Judiciary, including problem-solving community courts, drug courts, and domestic violence courts; specializing in commercial and matrimonial parts; overhauling the state’s jury system; and opening Family Court to the public. He has championed equal access to justice issue and taken an active leadership role in identifying permanent funding stream for civil legal services, addressed the systemic causes of wrongful convictions, and reformed New York’s juvenile system.

In 2008, Chief Judge Lippman received the William H. Rehnquist Award for Judicial Excellence, presented each year by the nation’s Chief Justice to a state court judge who exemplifies the highest level of judicial excellence, integrity, fairness, and professional ethics.

Liptak, Adam

Supreme Court Correspondent, The New York Times

Mr. Liptak participated in an Interchanges lunch with graduate students at Syracuse University. Please visit our Interchanges page for more information.

Since Mr. Liptak, a lawyer, joined the Times’ news staff in 2002, he has contributed reporting and analysis on legal matters. Mr. Liptak covered the Supreme Court nominations of John Roberts and Samuel Alito; the investigation into the disclosure of the identity of Valerie Wilson, an undercover C.I.A. operative; the trial of Lee Malvo, one of the Washington-area snipers; judicial ethics; and various aspects of the criminal justice system, notably capital punishment.

Mr. Liptak was born in Stamford, Conn., on Sept. 2, 1960. He first joined the Times as a copyboy in 1984, after graduation from Yale University, where he was an editor of The Yale Daily News Magazine, with a degree in English. In addition to clerical work and fetching coffee, he assisted the reporter M.A. Farber in covering the trial of a libel suit brought by Gen. William Westmoreland against CBS. Mr. Liptak returned to Yale for a law degree, graduating in 1988. During law school, he worked as a summer clerk in the The New York Times Company’s legal department. After graduating, he spent four years at Cahill Gordon & Reindel, a New York City law firm, as a litigation associate specializing in First Amendment matters. In 1992, he returned to the Times’ legal department, spending a decade advising the Times and the company’s other newspapers, television stations and new media properties on defamation, privacy, newsgathering and related issues, and he frequently litigated media and commercial cases.In 1995, Presstime magazine named him one of 20 leading newspaper professionals under the age of 40. In 1999, he received the New York Press Club’s John Peter Zenger award for “defending and advancing the cause of a free press.” In 2006, the same group awarded him its Crystal Gavel award for his journalistic work.

Mr. Liptak has served as the chairman of the New York City Bar Association’s communications and media law committee, was a member of the board of the Media Law Resource Center and has taught media law at the Columbia University School of Journalism. While working as a lawyer, Mr. Liptak wrote occasional book reviews for the Times and The New York Observer and contributed to other sections of the Times. His work has also appeared in The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, Business Week and The American Lawyer. He has written several law review articles as well, generally on First Amendment topics.

Mr. Liptak lives in Washington with his wife, Jennifer Bitman, a veterinarian, and their children Ivan and Katie.

Lithwick, Dahlia

Senior Editor, Slate.com

Ms. Lithwick participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, Lacrosse Justice: Gender, Race, and Fairness in the Duke Lacrosse Legal Saga, Supreme Makeover: Inventing a New Model of Judicial Openness on the High Court, and the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Dahlia Lithwick is a senior editor and legal correspondent for Slate.com, where she writes the column “Supreme Court Dispatches.” Ms. Lithwick has covered the Microsoft trial and other legal issues. Before joining Slate, she worked for a family law firm in Reno, Nev., and clerked for Procter Hug, chief justice of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in 1996. Her work has appeared in the New Republic, Commentary, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Elle, and on CNN.com. She is a weekly legal commentator for the NPR show, Day to Day. She co wrote Me v. Everybody: Absurd Contracts for an Absurd World (Workman Publishing, 2003), a legal humor book, and I Will Sing Life: Voices from the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp (Little, Brown & Co., 1992), a book about seven children from Paul Newman’s camp who have life-threatening illnesses. Ms. Lithwick was awarded the Online News Association’s award for online commentary in 2001. She received a B.A degree in English from Yale University in 1990 and a J.D degree from Stanford Law School in 1996.

Locy, Toni

Author, Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications, Washington and Lee University
Former Justice Department beat reporter, USA Today

Ms. Locy participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Ms. Locy was a journalist for 25 years, who reported and wrote for some of the nation’s biggest and best news organizations, specializing in the coverage of federal, state and local law enforcement, the federal trial and appellate courts, and the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2008 a federal judge held Ms. Locy in contempt of court for refusing to reveal the identities of nine confidential sources who provided information for stories she wrote for USA Today about the FBI’s investigation into the deadly 2001 anthrax attack. Eventually the U.S. Justice Department settled a civil lawsuit filed by scientist Steven Hatfill, and the judge vacated the contempt order against her. As a reporter, Ms. Locy wrote at least 4,000 bylined stories about everything from organized labor in Pittsburgh and the Mafia in Philadelphia to the State House in Boston and the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington. She now teaches Journalism and Mass Communications at Washington and Lee University, and is the author of “Covering America’s Courts: A Clash of Rights,” a journalism textbook on covering the courts and the law.

Lowney, Karen A.

Senior Staff Attorney, Hunton & Williams, LLP

Dr. Lowney participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Lowney’s practice focuses on all aspects of procuring, enforcing, defending and protecting intellectual property, with a specialization in life sciences and chemical intellectual property. Extensive experience in advising and counseling clients on intellectual property protection strategies; patent, know-how and trade secret licensing; patent prosecution; due diligence in corporate acquisitions, collaborations and joint ventures; and opinion work (patentability, infringement and enforceability). Dr. Lowney has represented U.S. and foreign clients in the areas of biotechnology (pharmaceutical, agricultural, industrial) cosmetic chemistry and packaging, dermatology, pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, and industrial chemicals; prepared and prosecuted patent applications, through the appeal stage, in a wide range of technologies; drafted and negotiated technology-related agreements (patent licenses and purchases, technology transfer, research collaboration, confidentiality, consulting, software licensing, manufacturing, professional services); participated in litigation at the trial level in pharmaceutical and cosmetic cases; and prepared infringement, validity, and freedom-to-operate opinions. Dr. Lowney earned her law degree from St. John’s University and a Ph.D in biology from New York University. She was formerly the Vice-President and Deputy General Counsel/Associate Counsel for The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. Dr. Lowney is admitted to the New York State Bar and is licensed to practice before the US Patent and Trademark Office.

Majarian, William

Senior Patent Counsel, GlaxoSmithKline

Dr. Majarian participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Majarian has been Senior Patent Counsel at GlaxoSmithKline since 2001. As part of his role as patent counsel at GlaxoSmithKline, Dr. Majarian focuses on issues such as: Biotechnology Patent Preparation and Prosecution, Litigation, Interference, Opinions, Counseling, Freedom-to-Operate, and Due Diligence. His education includes: B.S. in Biology from Muhlenberg College, M.S. and Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology from Hahnemann University, and a J.D. from Widener University. Prior to his time with GlaxoSmithKline, Dr. Majarian was employed by E. I. Du Pont de Nemours and Co. in Wilmington, DE. Dr. Majarian’s Bar Admissions include the Supreme Court of New Jersey, United States District Court-District of New Jersey, and United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Mann, Thomas

Senior Fellow, Governance Studies, The Brookings Institution

Mr. Mann participated in in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Thomas E. Mann is the W. Averell Harriman Chair and Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at The Brookings Institution. Between 1987 and 1999, Mr. Mann was Director of Governmental Studies at Brookings. Before that, he was executive director of the American Political Science Association. Mr. Mann earned his B.A. in political science at the University of Florida and his M.A. and Ph.D. at the University of Michigan. He first came to Washington in 1969 as a Congressional Fellow in the offices of Senator Philip A. Hart and Representative James G. O’Hara. Mr. Mann has taught at Princeton University, Johns Hopkins University, Georgetown University, the University of Virginia and American University; conducted polls for congressional candidates; worked as a consultant to IBM and the Public Broadcasting Service; chaired the Board of Overseers of the National Election Studies; and served as an expert witness in the constitutional defense of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. He lectures frequently in the United States and abroad on American politics and public policy and is also a regular contributor to newspaper stories and television and radio programs on politics and governance. Mr. Mann is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a recipient of the American Political Science Association’s Frank J. Goodnow and Charles E. Merriam Awards. Mr. Mann is currently working on projects dealing with redistricting, election reform, and campaign finance, and writing a book on Congress with Norman Ornstein.

Marburger, David

Partner, Baker Hostetler, LLP

Mr. Marburger participated in the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series, and the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

David Marburger is a partner in the Cleveland office of Baker Hostetler and has litigated more than 200 libel cause, challenged the constitutionality of more than 35 laws and court orders, defended against over two dozen prior restraints, sued for access more than 50 times to open the files and proceedings of state, local, and federal government agencies and courts, and defended and pursued dozens of copyright claims. Mr. Marburger has handled over 20 cases before the Ohio Supreme Court, and was the primary draftsman for his firm’s newspaper client’s brief on the merits before the United States Supreme Court, where Ohio’s largest newspaper won a First Amendment challenge of a municipal ordinance in Lakewood v. Plain Dealer Publishing, Co.

Mr. Marburger has drafted extensive amendments to Ohio’s open records and open meetings statutes, which the General Assembly enacted in various years, largely as drafted. The Ohio Attorney General appointed him to a two-year task force to conduct a comprehensive study of Ohio’s freedom of information laws, and he was the primary draftsman of the task force’s recommendation for statutory revision. Mr. Marburger has represented online media, major national television and radio networks, newspapers, book publishers, magazines, outdoor advertising companies, and wire services.

Before becoming a lawyer, Mr. Marburger was a journalist in a top ten market. He is a Syracuse University alumnus, graduating with a communications degree in 1976.  He earned his J.D. from University of Pittsburgh in 1983.

Maroney, Thomas J.

Professor of Law, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor Maroney participated in Lacrosse Justice: Gender, Race, and Fairness in the Duke Lacrosse Legal Saga. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Maroney was an editor of the Syracuse Law Review and a William Cook Fellow at the University of Michigan Law School. He practiced law with a major New York City law firm. He served as chair and board member of the Central New York chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union, as a visiting professor at the Colorado and Cornell law schools, and as assistant attorney general of the state of New York. He is a labor arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association. Professor Maroney was nominated by President Clinton and confirmed by the United States Senate to serve in the position of United States Attorney for the Northern District of New York.

Mauro, Tony

Supreme Court Correspondent, Legal Times, American Lawyer

Mr. Mauro participated in Supreme Makeover: Inventing a New Model of Judicial Openness on the High Court, and the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Mauro joined ALM in 2000 after covering the Supreme Court for USA Today and Gannett News Service for 20 years. He is also a legal correspondent for the First Amendment Center. A graduate of Rutgers University and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, Mr. Mauro’s 1998 stories on Supreme Court law clerks won a certificate of merit from the American Bar Association. He is the author of Illustrated Great Decisions of the Supreme Court (Congressional Quarterly Press, 2005) and has written several law review articles and contributed chapters to four books.

McDonald, Janis

Bond, Schoeneck & King Distinguished Professor, Syracuse University College of Law

Professor McDonald participated in the Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges.  Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor McDonald is the Bond, Schoeneck & King Distinguished Professor and the Co-Director of the Cold Case Justice Initiative (“CCJI”). CCJI was established in early 2007 by Professor McDonald and Professor Paula C. Johnson to assist the families of those killed by acts of racial hatred and violence in the civil rights era of the 1950s and 1960s. Over 50 law students have volunteered to investigate long buried information that might help persuade the FBI, The U.S. Department of Justice or local law enforcement officials to prosecute these long neglected murders. She and Professor Johnson also co-teach a unique new interdisciplinary course, “Investigating and Reopening Civil Rights Era Murders,” with graduate students from the College of Law and other graduate schools at Syracuse University. The course received the 2008 Syracuse University Chancellor’s Award for Public Engagement and Scholarship in Action. Professor Johnson and McDonald work to help other law schools adopt the model of the CCJI to assist other families who seek justice.

Professor McDonald is editor and co-author of Employment Discrimination: Problems, Cases and Critical Perspectives, published by Pearson/Prentice Hall in 2006. Her current book, Love Is Not Colorblind: Raising a Black Child in a Not So Polite White World, will be published in 2009. She is also working on another book, Henry Orne: Judge on the Underground Railroad or Slave Master in 1840 Maine?, which she expects to be published in 2010. She is the co-author with Professor Kevin Maillard of The Anatomy of Grey: A Theory of Interracial Convergence,” recently published by the University of Minnesota Journal of Law & Inequality. Her article, Heroes Or Spoilers: The Role of the Media in the Trials of Unsolved Civil Rights Era Murders, is scheduled for publication this fall by Ohio Northern University Law Review in their symposium issue.

Before joining the law faculty, Professor McDonald was a member of the law firm of Hirschkop & Grad, P.C., in Alexandria, Vir., where she litigated cases in the federal and local courts in the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Virginia. Several of her cases established new sexual harassment and medical malpractice laws. She taught at Ohio Northern University College of Law and Yale Law School. She was a Ford Foundation Fellow in Public and International Law and wrote several articles on civil rights litigation and American legal history. Several federal courts have cited her civil rights article. Professor McDonald served as president of the National Conference of Women’s Bar Associations, a national organization representing more than 80,000 women attorneys and was one of the two founders of the Virginia Women Attorneys Association. She teaches Constitutional Law, Investigating and Reopening Civil Rights Era Murders, Criminal Law, Employment Discrimination and American Legal History. She also participates in the emerging field of Critical White Racial Studies.

McGraw, Warren

Former Justice, West Virginia Supreme Court

Justice McGraw participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Justice McGraw earned his A.B. in 1960 from Morris Harvey College (University of Charleston), attended West Virginia University Graduate School and earned his J.D. in 1963 from Wake Forest (Baptist) University. He was admitted to the West Virginia State Bar in 1963. Justice McGraw has been elected to a greater number of constitutional offices than any other West Virginian. He has served in all three branches of West Virginia government. He received a designation as one of the nation’s outstanding legislators from Rutgers University. He also was featured on the National Public Television series Bill Moyers Journal, in “If Elected,” a one-hour special on local electoral process.  He received the Friend of Education, Margaret Baldwin Award from the West Virginia Education Association and participated in Marshall University’s Taft Lecture Series.  His past employment includes open hearth steel worker, U.S. Steel Corporation; chemical worker, Union Carbide Corporation; U.S. Department of Justice trial attorney Washington, D.C.; legal services attorney; instructor, West Virginia University Extension; and the private general practice of law.

McGregor, Ruth V.

Chief Justice, Arizona Supreme Court

Justice McGregor participated as a Jurist in Residence. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Chief Justice Ruth McGregor served on the Arizona Supreme Court from February 1998 until June 2009. She was the Court’s Chief Justice from June 2005 until her retirement. She was also a member of the Arizona Court of Appeals from 1989 until 1998, where she served as Chief Judge from 1995 to 1997. Before her appointment to the bench, Justice McGregor engaged in private practice as a member of Fennemore Craig law firm in Phoenix, Arizona. She also served as law clerk to Justice Sandra Day O’Connor during Justice O’Connor’s first year on the United States Supreme Court.

Justice McGregor received a Bachelor of Arts degree, summa cum laude,and a Master of Arts degree, summa cum laude, from the University of Iowa. She received her Juris Doctor, summa cum laude, from Arizona State University in 1974 and a Master of Laws in the Judicial Process from the University of Virginia.

Justice McGregor has participated extensively in professional activities, particularly those involving legal education and the discipline of lawyers and judges. Among other activities, she has served as an officer and a member of the Board of Trustees for the American Inns of Court Foundation, as an officer and Board member for the National Association of Women Judges, as a board member of the Conference of Chief Justices, and on the Legal Council of the American Bar Association Section of Legal Education and Admission to the Bar, which is the accrediting body for American law schools.

McKee, Theodore

Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit

Judge McKee participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Theodore A. McKee was born near Rochester, New York. Judge McKee attended State University of New York (SUNY) at Cortland, where he was active in student government and played football, graduating in 1969. Judge McKee then worked as director of minority recruitment at SUNY Binghamton. His efforts there included recruiting graduate students from Jackson State University in Mississippi. He also began a program to recruit qualified applicants from prison to the University.  In 1972 he enrolled in Syracuse University College of Law where he now sits as a member of the Board of Advisors. He graduated from law school magna cum laude and Order of the Coif. Judge McKee began his legal career at the firm of Wolf, Block, Schorr and Solis-Cohen in 1975. From 1977 to 1980, Judge McKee served as assistant United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. He was appointed deputy city solicitor for the city of Philadelphia and then was hired in 1983 as general counsel for the Philadelphia Parking Authority. In 1984, Judge McKee was elected judge of the Court of Common Pleas, First Judicial District, Pennsylvania where he presided for over 10 years. He was nominated to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 1994. Judge McKee is a trustee of Temple University an adviser to the American Law Institute in its current examination of the sentencing provisions of the Model Penal Code, and a Commissioner on the American Bar Association’s Kennedy Commission which is examining sentencing policy in the United States. He was formerly a trustee of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation in New York City.

Michel, Paul R.

Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit

Chief Judge Michel participated in the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Paul R. Michel was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in March of 1988. In December of 2004, he assumed the duties of Chief Judge. Chief Judge Michel has written over 300 opinions in patent, trademark, takings, contract, tax, international trade, veterans’ rights,  and government personnel cases. He is the recipient of the Eli Whitney Prize, the Katz-Kiley Prize, and the Jefferson Medal. In September 2001, he was made a Member of Honor of the Fédération Internationale des Conseils en Propriété  Industrielle (FICPI), the worldwide organization of patent attorneys in private practice. Since 2003, he has been named by Managing Intellectual Property magazine as one of the 50 Most Influential People in the world in intellectual property.   In March 2007, Chief Judge Michel was awarded the New York Intellectual Property Law Association’s Fifth Annual Outstanding Public Service Award. Prior to his appointment, Chief Judge Michel served in the executive and legislative branches of the government for 22 years. Following graduation from Williams College in 1963 and the University of Virginia Law School in 1966, he served as Assistant District Attorney and Deputy District Attorney for Investigations in Philadelphia under Arlen Specter; as Assistant Special Watergate Prosecutor under Leon Jaworski, responsible for the Howard Hughes-Bebe Rebozo-Rosemary Woods slush fund investigation; and under  Dick Thornburgh as Deputy Chief of the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section directing the “Koreagate” investigation. From 1975 to 1976, he was assistant counsel for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (Church Committee). In 1978, he was appointed by Benjamin Civiletti as an Associate Deputy Attorney General, helping to supervise U.S. Attorneys, the FBI, and the Marshals Service. From April 1981 until March of 1988, he served on Senator Arlen Specter’s staff, including as Chief of Staff. Since 2004, he has been a member of the Judicial Conference of the United States, the governing body of the Judicial Branch, and, since 2005, he has served on its Executive Committee by appointment of the Chief Justice of the United States.

Morrow, Dr. Cynthia

Health Commissioner, Onondaga County

Dr. Morrow participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Dr. Cynthia Morrow is Commissioner of Health for Onondaga County in Syracuse, N.Y. She is also an assistant professor of Public Health and Preventive Medicine and an assistant professor of Pediatrics at SUNY Upstate Medical University. In addition to the responsibilities of leading a large academic health department, Dr. Morrow is committed to developing and fostering community partnerships to address a wide range of public health concerns.

Dr. Morrow holds a Bachelor’s degree in psychobiology from Swarthmore College and a combined MD/MPH from Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston, Massachusetts.

Morton, Wendy S.

Associate Judge, Scottsdale City Court

Judge Morton participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Wendy S. Morton is an Associate Judge with the Scottsdale City Court in Scottsdale, Ariz. Judge Morton was appointed to the bench in 2005. From 1993 to 2002, she served as a prosecutor with the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office in Phoenix and while at the County Attorney’s Office, she received several Special Recognition awards. In 1997, Judge Morton was named Juvenile Division Attorney of the Year and the Arizona Bar Foundation’s Attorney of the Year for Legal Education. She sits on the Executive Council of the State Bar’s Public Lawyer’s Section and is a member of the Arizona Magistrate’s Association. Judge Morton was co-chair of the 2008 Arizona State Bar Convention Committee and is a member of the Judicial College of Arizona’s Continuing Judicial Education Committee. She has served for 10 years as a Regional Coordinator for the Arizona High School Mock Trial program. She recently completed a six year term on the Board of Directors of the Arizona Foundation for Legal Services and Education. Judge Morton is the author and illustrator of “Court Story,” a nationally award winning coloring book for young victims of crime. She is a 1989 graduate of Syracuse University, where she dual majored in broadcast journalism and political science. She graduated from Widener University Law School in 1992.

Mueller, Milton L.

Professor, School of Information Studies, Syracuse University

Professor Mueller participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Mueller teaches and does research on the political economy of communication and information. He uses the theoretical tools of property rights analysis, institutional economics and both historical and quantitative social science methods. He has a longstanding interest in the history of communication technologies and global governance institutions. Professor Mueller received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1989. His most recent research projects explore the efforts of citizens and activists to shape communication and information policy, both globally and nationally. His acclaimed book Ruling the Root: Internet Governance and the Taming of Cyberspace (MIT Press, 2002) was the first scholarly account of the Internet governance debates. His book Universal Service: Competition, Interconnection and Monopoly in the Making of the American Telephone System (MIT Press, 1997) set out a dramatic revision of our understanding of the origins of universal telephone service and the role of interconnection in industry development. Professor Mueller’s research has been cited and utilized by policymakers in the U.S., Europe, Hong Kong, and New Zealand. He is on the international editorial boards of the journals Telecommunications Policy, The Information Society, and Info: the journal of policy, regulation and strategy for telecommunication, information and media.

Murphy, James P.

Justice, Onondaga County Supreme Court

Justice Murphy participated in the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Justice Murphy is the Coordinating Judge of Town and Village Courts of the Fifth Judicial District. Justice Murphy was elected to the New York Supreme Court in 2004. Before taking the bench, he was a sole practitioner of a general civil trial practice with an emphasis on municipal law in Skaneateles, N.Y., and a member of the Onondaga County Legislature serving in a leadership position as Chair of the Ways and Means Committee. He previously served as an Assistant District Attorney for Onondaga County.

Justice Murphy received a B.S. in History from St. Lawrence University and a J.D. from Syracuse University College of Law. He is an Adjunct Professor at LeMoyne College, teaching Business Law.

Nevitt, Chris

City Councilman, Denver, Colorado

Councilman Nevitt participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Chris Nevitt is a City Councilman in Denver, Colorado. Councilman Nevitt earned a Ph.D. in Political Science from University of California, San Diego, in 1996. After teaching for several years at Arizona State University, he moved to Denver, Colorado.  There he helped found and then ran the Front Range Economic Strategy Center, the research, policy, and public-interest organizing arm of the metro Denver union movement.  In 2007 Councilman Nevitt ran for and won a seat on the Denver City Council.

Obbie, Mark

Author and Journalist
Former Executive Editor, The American Lawyer
Former Professor of Journalism, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University

Mr. Obbie participated in Lacrosse Justice: Gender, Race, and Fairness in the Duke Lacrosse Legal Saga, Supreme Makeover: Inventing a New Model of Judicial Openness on the High Court, Law and Media Seminar for Federal Judges, and the 2013 Law, Politics and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Mark Obbie has been a legal-affairs journalist for more than 30 years. Mr. Obbie is a former associate professor of magazine journalism at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, and one of the founding faculty members of IJPM. He now is a freelance writer and author specializing in crime narratives and criminal justice policy stories.

Mr. Obbie is the former executive editor of The American Lawyer magazine in New York City, where he edited features and the front of the book. In managing the newsroom staff, Mr. Obbie was in charge of the magazine’s well-known program of recruiting and training of entry-level journalists. He also managed the Internet operations for a network of legal magazines and newspapers, was editor and publisher of the Dallas-based weekly newspaper Texas Lawyer, and covered courts, cops, and city government for The Houston Post and The Tribune-Chronicle in Warren, Ohio. He has taught investigative reporting as an adjunct instructor at New School University in New York. As a freelance magazine writer, his work has appeared in such magazines as Inc., The American Lawyer, and Slate.com.

He has a Master’s degree from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and a Bachelor’s degree from St. John Fisher College.

Olin, Dirk

Director, Judicial Reports

Mr. Olin participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, and the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Dirk Olin is the director of the Institute for Judicial Studies, a non-partisan, non-ideological think tank devoted to collecting and disseminating data on the performance of judges. Mr. Olin is the former national editor of The American Lawyer and a longtime legal and political journalist for such publications as The New Republic, Mother Jones, The New York Times Magazine, and Slate.com. He is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.

Ornstein, Norman

Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute

Mr. Ornstein participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Norman J. Ornstein is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. Mr. Ornstein also serves as an election analyst for CBS News. In addition, he writes for USA Today as a member of its Board of Contributors, and writes a weekly column called “Congress Inside Out” for Roll Call newspaper. Mr. Ornstein has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Foreign Affairs, and other major publications, and regularly appears on television programs like The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Nightline, and Charlie Rose. Mr. Ornstein serves as senior counselor to the Continuity of Government Commission, working to ensure that our institutions of government can be maintained in the event of a terrorist attack on Washington; his efforts in this area are recounted in a profile of him in the June 2003 Atlantic Monthly. His campaign finance working group of scholars and practitioners helped shape the major law, known as McCain/Feingold, that reformed the campaign financing system. Legal Times referred to Mr. Ornstein as “a principal drafter of the law” and his role in its design and enactment was profiled in the February 2004 issue of Washington Lawyer. He is also co-directing a multi-year effort, called the Transition to Governing Project, to create a better climate for governing in the era of the permanent campaign. Mr. Ornstein is a member of the Board of Directors of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and the Campaign Legal Center and of the Board of Trustees of the U.S. Capitol Historical Society. He was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2004. His many books include The Permanent Campaign and Its Future; Intensive Care: How Congress Shapes Health Policy, both with Thomas E. Mann; and Debt and Taxes: How America Got Into Its Budget Mess and What to Do About It, with John H. Makin.

Ovalle, Carlos

Computer Systems Development Specialist, School of Information, University of Texas at Austin

Mr. Ovalle participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Ovalle serves as a Copyright Scholar for the American Library Association. As part of the Copyright Advisory Network team, he helped to create and manages the ALA’s CAN Web site, an online resource that answers librarians’ and others’ questions about copyright. Mr. Ovalle examines copyright-related issues for ALA, including how copyright affects academic, public and school libraries, and provides workshops and lectures on the subject for librarians and educators. He assists the ACLU of Texas in their cyberliberties area, and is on the board of directors of EFF-Austin.

Parloff, Roger

Senior Editor, Legal Affairs, FORTUNE Magazine

Mr. Parloff participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Roger Parloff is a senior writer at FORTUNE, where he covers a wide range of legal issues—from mass torts to intellectual property. Formerly a practicing criminal litigation attorney in Manhattan, Mr. Parloff has been a full-time journalist since 1988. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The American Lawyer, Inside.com, New York, Legal Affairs, Legal Times, and Spectrum. He has been a regular contributor to FORTUNE since 2002. Mr. Parloff won a National Magazine Award in 1993 for a commentary in The American Lawyer. His March 2002 FORTUNE article about the asbestos litigation crisis—“The $200 Billion Miscarriage of Justice”—was selected for inclusion in The Best Business Stories of the Year. Mr. Parloff is also the author of Triple Jeopardy (Little, Brown and Company, 1996), a non-fiction book about the death penalty. He has a B.A. from Harvard and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

Pooler, Rosemary S.

Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

Judge Pooler participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, the 2008 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series, and the 2015 Law, Politics and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Judge Rosemary S. Pooler is a United States Circuit Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. At the time of her appointment in 1998, she was a United States District Judge for the Northern District of New York. Judge Pooler received her B.A. from Brooklyn College in 1959, an M.A. in History from the University of Connecticut in 1961, and her J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School in 1965. She also attended the Program for Senior Managers in Government of Harvard University in 1978, and earned a Graduate Certificate in Regulatory Economics from the State University of New York at Albany in 1978. Judge Pooler engaged in the private practice of law in Syracuse from 1966 until 1972. She served as Assistant Corporation Counsel/Director of the Consumer Affairs Unit for the City of Syracuse from 1972 to 1973. From 1974 to 1975, Judge Pooler was a District Representative on the Common Council of the City of Syracuse. From 1975 until 1980 she was Chair and Executive Director of the Consumer Protection Board of the State of New York. She served as a member of the New York State Public Service Commission from 1981 until 1986. In 1987, Judge Pooler was Staff Director of the Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions of the New York State Assembly. She was Visiting Professor of Law at Syracuse University from 1987 until 1988, and was Vice-President for Legal Affairs of the Atlantic States Legal Foundation from 1989 until 1990. In 1990, she became a Justice of the Supreme Court, Fifth Judicial District, State of New York, and served in this position until becoming a United States District Judge for the Northern District of New York in 1994. Judge Pooler is a native of the City of New York.

Reed Amar, Akhil

Sterling Professor of Law, Yale Law School

Professor Amar participated in Symposium on America’s Constitution: A Biography. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Akhil Reed Amar is Sterling Professor of Law and Political Science at Yale University, where he teaches constitutional law at both Yale College and Yale Law School. Professor Amar received his B.A, summa cum laude, in 1980 from Yale College, and his J.D. in 1984 from Yale Law School, where he served as an editor of The Yale Law Journal. After clerking for Judge Stephen Breyer, U.S. Court of Appeals, 1st Circuit, Professor Amar joined the Yale faculty in 1985. Along with Dean Paul Brest and Professors Sanford Levinson, Jack Balkin, and Reva Siegel, Professor Amar is the co-editor of a leading constitutional law casebook, Processes of Constitutional Decisionmaking. He is also the author of several books, including The Constitution and Criminal Procedure: First Principles (Yale Univ. Press, 1997), The Bill of Rights: Creation and Reconstruction (Yale Univ. Press, 1998), and most recently, America’s Constitution: A Biography (Random House, 2005).

Rosen, Jeffrey

Professor of Law, The George Washington University School of Law

Professor Rosen participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Rosen teaches constitutional law, criminal procedure, and the law of privacy. He is also the legal affairs editor of The New Republic. His first book, The Unwanted Gaze: The Destruction of Privacy in America (2001) was called by The New York Times “the definitive text on privacy perils in the digital age.” His latest book, The Naked Crowd: Reclaiming Security and Freedom in an Anxious Age (2004) was called by Harvard Law Review a “thoughtful and engaging read … [that] provides much-needed depth to the debate over balancing privacy and security in an age of terrorism.” Professor Rosen is a graduate of Harvard College, summa cum laude, Oxford University, where he was a Marshall Scholar, and Yale Law School. His essays and book reviews have appeared in many publications, including The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, and The New Yorker, where he has been a staff writer. He is a frequent contributor to National Public Radio.

Rottman, David

Principal Court Research Consultant, National Center for State Courts

Mr. Rottman participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

David B. Rottman is a principal court research consultant at the National Center for State Courts (NCSC), where his current research concerns judicial selection, public opinion on the courts, and the evolution of court structures. Mr. Rottman serves as the NCSC coordinator of the Election Law Program established jointly with the William and Mary School of Law. Mr. Rottman received a Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Illinois at Urbana and is the author of books on community justice, contemporary Ireland, and social inequality. He previously served on the staff of the Economic and Social Research Institute in Dublin, Ireland and taught at the University of Connecticut and the National University of Ireland. The Irish government appointed him to serve on a Committee of Inquiry into the Prison System and a Commission on Social Welfare.

Rubin, David

Professor and Dean Emeritus, S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University

David M. Rubin was Dean of the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University from 1990 to 2008, and is currently a member of the full-time faculty of the school. Prior to working at Syracuse University, Dean Rubin spent 19 years as a member of the faculty and chair of the Department of Journalism at New York University.

Dean Rubin oversaw the construction of $32 million expansion of the Newhouse School, adding a third building that houses a state-of-the-art experimental lab for new approaches to online news delivery, as well as housing offices for student services, new classrooms, a research center, and a career center. During Dean Rubin’s tenure, he established an office of external relations that has developed a highly successful career center, an alumni relations operation that involved more than 3,500 graduates, and a development program that has significantly increased annual fund giving to the school. Dean Rubin is responsible for sourcing over $27 million in funding for buildings, scholarships, and departments within the Newhouse School. He was also instrumental in aiding Professor Robert Thompson create the Center for the Study of Popular Television with a gift from alumnus Ed Bleier.

Dean Rubin is the co-creator and host of the highly respected “The Ivory Tower Half Hour,” a regular round-table discussion of public affairs that airs on WCNY-TV every Friday at 8 p.m. He also serves on the boards of WCNY-TV and the Cultural Resources Council of Central New York, and is a contributing columnist for The Syracuse Post-Standard, as well as a regular reviewer of  opera for Cafemomus.com.

In both 1998 and 1999, Dean Rubin served as a Pulitzer Prize judge. In 1998 he judged “Explanatory Journalism,” and in 1999 he judged “Public Service Journalism.” Dean Rubin holds a B.A. from Columbia in American history, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in communication from Stanford University. His teaching specialties are Media and Society, Communications Law, and Arts Journalism.

Saker Woeste, Victoria

Research Professor, American Bar Foundation

Professor Woeste participated in “Henry Ford’s War on Jews and the Legal Battle Against Hate Speech.” Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Victoria Saker Woeste was educated at the University of Virginia (B.A.) and the University of California at Berkeley (M.A., Ph.D.), where she trained as an interdisciplinary academic in law and social science. Since joining the American Bar Foundation in 1994, Professor Woeste has established herself as a leading scholar in the field of U.S. legal history, specifically twentieth century business regulation and political economy. Her first book, The Farmer’s Benevolent Trust, won the Law and Society Association’s J. Willard Hurst Prize in 2000; in dissertation form it was awarded the 1993 Herman Krooss Prize of the Business History Conference.

Professor Woeste’s current work is Suing Henry Ford:  America’s First Hate Speech Case, an explosive re-telling of a familiar episode in American history: the 1927 libel lawsuit against Henry Ford and his antisemitic newspaper. This study opens previously unexplored vistas into the history of the legal profession, the history of hate speech, and the history of civil rights activism. Other projects include a biographical study of the civil rights lawyer Louis Marshall (1856-1929) and a study of the relationship between farm size, farm ownership (including racial and gender factors), and agricultural monopoly after World War II.

Scafidi, Susan

Associate Professor of Law, SMU Dedman School of Law

Professor Scafidi participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Susan Scafidi specializes in the fields of intellectual property and cultural property, and has testified before Congress regarding the proposed extension of intellectual property protection to fashion design. She is currently a visiting professor at Fordham Law School, as well as an associate professor of law and adjunct professor of history at SMU. Professor Scafidi has also taught at the University of Chicago, Saint Louis University School of Law, the Yale Law School, and the Georgetown University Law Center. Following graduation from the Yale Law School and Duke University, Professor Scafidi served as law clerk to the Honorable Morris S. Arnold of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. She also pursued graduate study in legal history at the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Chicago. Professor Scafidi is the author of Who Owns Culture?  Appropriation and Authenticity in American Law (2005), and a website on law and fashion, Counterfeit Chic.

Scherer, Nancy

Professor, Wellesley College

Professor Scherer participated in Are Federal Judges Political: Views from the Academy, the Bench, and the Press. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Scherer has research and teaching interests in American politics with a primary emphasis on judicial politics and public law. Her research focuses on judicial behavior and the federal court appointment process. Professor Scherer is the author of the book Scoring Points: Politicians, Activists and the Lower Court Appointment Process, published by Stanford University Press. She has also published in the journals Political Science Quarterly, Law and Society Review and Judicature. Professor Scherer was the 2002 recipient of the Edwin S. Corwin Award, given by the American Political Science Association, for best dissertation on public law.

Scullin, Jr., Frederick J.

Senior Judge, United States District Court for the Northern District of New York

Judge Scullin participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Scullin, a native of Syracuse, N.Y., attended and graduated from Niagara University in 1961, and Syracuse University College of Law in 1964. In November 1964, Judge Scullin entered active duty with the United States Army, received training as a paratrooper and ranger, and thereafter served as an infantry commander with the 173rd Airborne Brigade in the Republic of Vietnam. Following active military service, Judge Scullin entered the private practice of law with the firm of Germain & Germain in Syracuse, N.Y. Thereafter, he served as an Assistant District Attorney for Onondaga County. In 1971, the New York State Attorney General appointed him as one of the original prosecutors of the then newly-formed Statewide Organized Crime Task Force; and, in that capacity, he served as the Assistant in Charge of the Albany Regional Office. In 1978, the Governor of the State of Florida appointed him as Chief Prosecutor of the Governor’s Council for the prosecution of organized crime. He returned to the private practice of law in 1980; and in 1982 he was appointed United States Attorney for the Northern District of New York, a position he held until his appointment to the federal bench. In March 2004, then-Chief Justice Rehnquist appointed Judge Scullin to a seven-year term on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which is in session throughout the year in Washington D.C. Senior Judge Scullin is also a member of the Federal Court Bar Association for the Northern District of New York, Federal Bar Council, State of Florida Bar Association, Onondaga County Bar Association (having served on the Board of Directors from 1998 to 1990), honorary member of the Board of Advisors, Syracuse University College of Law, and the Law College Association of Syracuse University. He is also a past member and chairman of the City of Syracuse, County of Onondaga, Drug & Alcohol Abuse Commission; a member of the Board of Directors, Elmcrest Children’s Center; and a member of the Franciscan Collaborative Ministries Advisory Council. Senior Judge Scullin is married to the former Veronica (Cricket) Terek. They have five daughters and reside in Liverpool, N.Y.

See, Harold

Justice, Supreme Court of Alabama

Justice See participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary, and the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about these events.

Justice See is a former Associate Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Emporia State University, Kansas, his Master of Science degree in economics from Iowa State University, and his Juris Doctor degree from the University of Iowa College of Law, where he graduated with honors and was awarded the Order of the Coif. Justice See worked his way through school as a heavy equipment operator, a sheet metal worker, and a roofer. He served as Assistant Professor of Economics at Illinois State University and practiced law with the nationally recognized law firm of Sidley & Austin. Justice See then joined the faculty at the University of Alabama School of Law, where he served for over twenty years successively as Associate Professor, Full Professor, and Herbert D. Warner Professor of Law. In 1996, he was elected Associate Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. Justice See has served as a contributing editor to the Federal Circuit Bar Journal, and he is a member of the American Law Institute, the Alabama Law Institute, the American Law and Economics Association, the Federalist Society, the American Bar Association, the Alabama State Bar Association, and V.O.C.A.L., a victims’ rights advocacy group. He served as reporter for the Alabama Trade Secrets Acts and the revisions to the Alabama Trademark Law. Justice See has authored or edited over 40 books, chapters, articles, and reviews. Justice See is an active member of First Baptist Church, Montgomery, where he teaches Sunday school, and was formerly an active member and deacon of Calvary Baptist Church in Tuscaloosa. He is a member and the founding President of the Carroll’s Creek Volunteer Fire Department, which is now a fire protection district.

Sherman, Jonathan

Partner, Boies, Schiller & Flexner, LLP

Mr. Sherman participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jonathan Sherman is a partner specializing in complex commercial litigation, and media defense and First Amendment matters at Boies, Schiller & Flexner, LLP. He graduated from University of Rochester, magna cum laude, with a B.A. in History, and he holds an M.A. in History from Yale University and a J.D. from Stanford Law School. Mr. Sherman has more than sixteen years’ experience defending and counseling clients (both media and non-media) in matters involving defamation, access to government and judicial proceedings, copyright and privacy rights, government funding of speech, Internet-related access disputes, and international free speech rights. In the First Amendment area, Mr. Sherman, was lead counsel on behalf of Court TV in litigation challenging the constitutionality of New York’s statutory ban on television cameras in that state’s courtrooms. He currently represents Courtroom View Network, which provides streaming Internet transmissions of judicial proceedings, in its attempts to cover federal court proceedings. He recently assisted CBS Corp. in its defense to the FCC’s indecency fine for the 2004 Super Bowl Halftime Show and, in 2005, he represented a large media company in connection with an investigation of a leak of information from a highly publicized grand jury proceeding. Between 1998 and 2001, Mr. Sherman was an Adjunct Associate Professor of Law at Fordham, and he was also a Visiting Lecturer at Yale College in 1993.

Silbey, Susan

Leon and Anne Goldberg Professor of Humanities, Sociology and Anthropology, Professor of Behavioral and Policy Sciences, Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Professor Silbey participated in “Law, Courtesy, Hypocrisy: A conversation on “All Judges Are Political – Except When They Are Not…” Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Slotnick, Barry

Partner and Chair, Intellectual Property and Entertainment Litigation Group, Loeb & Loeb, LLP

Mr. Slotnick participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Barry Slotnick is a nationally recognized copyright and trademark litigator who has represented clients in the entertainment, advertising, licensing and merchandising industries in courts throughout the United States. Mr. Slotnick’s clients have included entertainment companies such as SONY BMG Entertainment, Bertelsmann, EMI Music, The Lyons Group (producers of “Barney & Friends”), Brockum, Peer Music, Windswept Holdings, Rainbow Media, American Movie Classics, Independent Film Channel, Broadcast Music Inc., Sociedad General de Autores y Editores and the Recording Industry Association of America. He also has represented artists and creators such as the Allman Bros. Band, Beastie Boys, Linkin Park, Billy Squier, Queensryche, Gian Marco and the J.R.R. Tolkien Estate. His representation includes companies such as Anheuser-Busch, CKx, Dell Computers, DDB Worldwide, Eveready Battery, Motorola, Toyota and Harley Davidson. Mr. Slotnick has litigated scores of copyright and trademark infringement cases as well as numerous matters in the entertainment industry addressing the respective rights of copyright and trademark owners and users, including numerous cases involving rights of privacy and publicity. As a frequent speaker, Mr. Slotnick regularly contributes on copyright and entertainment issues for the Practicing Law Institute and other industry groups. Mr. Slotnick did his undergraduate work at Queens College and earned his law degree from the Syracuse University College of Law.

Smith, Paul

Partner, Jenner & Block

Mr. Smith participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Paul M. Smith is Chair of the Appellate and Supreme Court Practice and Co-Chair of the Media and First Amendment, and Election Law and Redistricting Practices at Jenner & Block. Mr. Smith has had an active Supreme Court practice for three decades, including oral arguments in 15 cases involving matters ranging from free speech and civil rights to civil procedure. Among his important victories have been Lawrence v. Texas, the landmark gay rights case, and Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Ass’n, establishing the First Amendment rights of those who produce and sell video games. Mr. Smith is a member of the firm’s Content, Media & Entertainment Practice and serves on the Policy Committee. He also serves the firm as a member of the Diversity & Inclusion Committee. He represents the members of the D.C. Bar in the ABA House of Delegates. Mr. Smith was a member of the D.C. Bar Board of Governors from 2002-2008. He is a member and former chair of the National Board of Directors of the American Constitution Society and former board member and co-chair of Lambda Legal. Mr. Smith is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Washington Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs.

Spahn, Thomas

Partner, McGuire Woods, LLP

Mr. Spahn participated in the 2013 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Thomas Spahn has practiced as a commercial litigator with McGuire Woods since 1977. Mr. Spahn regularly advises a number of Fortune 500 companies on such issues as properly creating and preserving the attorney-client privilege and work product protections when conducting corporate investigations, when hiring outside consultants, when dealing with the government, and during other daily and extraordinary situations. He has assisted in creating and defending privilege logs in many product liability and commercial litigation matters. He also advises in-house counsel on ethics issues, including conflicts of interest, confidentiality, dealing with corporate wrongdoing, and compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley requirements.

Mr. Spahn has written and lectured widely on such topics as ethics, professionalism, attorney‑client privilege, work product doctrine, defamation, and legal writing. He has written several editions of a book on the attorney‑client privilege and the work product doctrine. The ABA’s General Practice Section honored Mr. Spahn’s article on Litigation Ethics in the Modern Age as one of the “Best Articles Published by the ABA” in 2004.

Since 1988, Mr. Spahn has spoken at more than a thousand CLE programs throughout the United States, and in several foreign countries. After personally reading, summarizing, and categorizing over 1,600 Virginia Bar Legal Ethics Opinions, he made his work available to the public online through his bio page on the McGuire Woods web site.

As Chairman of the Virginia State Bar Committee on Publications/Public Information, Mr. Spahn led that Committee in developing public service announcements articulating lawyers’ benefit to society, which were extensively published in Virginia, and purchased by the bars of six other states and the Canadian Bar Association. As Chairman of the Virginia Bar Association Commission on Professionalism, he acted as principal drafter of Principles of Professionalism that have been endorsed by the Virginia Supreme Court and the Virginia Attorney General’s Office, and commended by both of Virginia’s federal district courts.

Mr. Spahn is a Fellow of both the Virginia Law Foundation and the American Bar Foundation (whose membership is limited to one-third of one percent of America’s lawyers). Mr. Spahn graduated magna cum laude from Yale University and received his J.D. from Yale Law School.

Spathas, Chrysse

Vice President, Broadcast Standards and Practices, ABC Inc.

Ms. Spathas participated in the 2015 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Ms. Spathas is Vice President, Broadcast Standards and Practices (“BS&P”) at ABC, Inc. She oversees the BS&P Department in New York, which is responsible for reviewing and approving all advertising material for the ABC Television Network and ABC Family. Prior to joining ABC, Ms. Spathas was Associate Director at the National Advertising Division (“NAD”), which she joined in 1992. Ms. Spathas is an attorney and a registered pharmacist.

Stein, Sidney H.

Judge, United States District Court for the Southern District of New York

Judge Stein participated in The Undulating Role of Federal Judges in Sentencing. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Judge Stein is a United States District Court Judge for the Southern District of New York. He was appointed by President Clinton in January 1995 and he was confirmed and received commission in March 1995. Judge Stein attended New York University Graduate School of Education, received an A.B. from Princeton University in 1967, and received his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1972. He was in the New York Army National Guard from 1969 to 1975 and was a law clerk to the Honorable Stanley Fuld, Chief Judge, New York Court of Appeals from 1972 to 1973. From 1974 to his appointment in 1995, Judge Stein was in private practice in New York City.

Stimson, David

Chief Trademark Counsel, Eastman Kodak Company

Mr. Stimson participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Stimson has worldwide responsibility for Kodak’s trademarks and copyrights. He is a graduate of Hamilton College and the University of Cincinnati College of Law. Mr. Stimson was president of the International Trademark Association from 1997 to 1998. He was a member of INTA’s Select Committee on the Federal Trademark Dilution Act and currently serves on INTA’s International Amicus Committee. Mr. Stimson was a member of the Trademark Public Advisory Committee to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from 2000 to 2003. He has taught courses on trademark law and internet law at Syracuse University College of Law and the University of Cincinnati College of Law.

Sullivan, Marguerite

Senior Director, Center for International Media Assistance, National Endowment for Democracy

Ms. Sullivan participated in the 2012 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Marguerite Sullivan is senior director of the Center for International Media Assistance, a think tank at the National Endowment for Democracy (“NED”). The Center, which she came to NED to launch nearly five years ago, studies the indispensable role independent media play in the creation and development of sustainable democracies.

Ms. Sullivan began her career as a journalist working for newspapers in Boston and California before moving to Washington, D.C., where she was a reporter and columnist for Copley News Service and newspapers. She covered Congress, federal agencies and departments, and wrote a column. She also served as president of the Washington Press Club, now the National Press Club, and was executive editor of The Washington Woman magazine.

Ms. Sullivan has held several government positions including int he U.S.Department of State, the National Endowment for Humanities, and the White House, and also served as a cabinet member for a U.S. state governor. She was executive director of the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO, and was vice president for communications and external affairs for an NGO that works on democracy issues.

Ms. Sullivan is a native of California, has a Bachelor’s degree in history and a Master’s degree in journalism from Stanford University. She is a former fellow at the Institute of politics at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and has lectured at the Smithsonian Institution, as well as colleges and universities.

Taricani, Jim

Investigative Reporter, WJAR-TV

Mr. Taricani participated in Jail for Journalists: Freedom of the Press, Confidential Sources, and the Demands of Criminal Justice. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jim Taricani is an investigative reporter for WJAR’s I-Team. Mr. Taricani received the 2005 Press Freedom Award from the Radio/Television News Directors Association and was honored by the Reporters’ Committee for Freedom of the Press for Ethics in Journalism. He received a six-month home confinement sentence for refusing to disclose a confidential source. He won the Edward R. Murrow award in 1996 for investigative reporting, and has received four Emmy Awards and has nine Emmy nominations, as well as 12 Associated Press awards, and a “professionalism” award from the Radio/Television News Directors Association. Mr. Taricani has appeared on “NBC Nightly News,” MSNBC’s Chris Matthews program, “Greater Boston” on WGBH in Boston and featured in articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times and The Providence Journal, regarding the importance of having Congress pass a federal shield law for reporters. He was inducted into the Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame, and received an outstanding airman award while serving in the NATO forces in England in 1969. He is a member of the board of directors of Amos House in Providence and volunteers for the National Kidney Foundation and the New England Organ Bank.

Tarr, G. Alan

Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Rutgers University-Camden

Professor Tarr participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Tarr is the Director of the Center for State Constitutional Studies and Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Rutgers University-Camden. He serves as editor of State Constitutions of the United States, a 52-volume reference series (Greenwood Press) and as co-editor, with Robert Williams, of “Subnational Constitutions” for the International Encyclopedia of Laws (Kluwer). He is the author of Understanding State Constitutions, (Princeton University Press) and Judicial Process and Judicial Policymaking, (West); co-author of State Supreme Courts in State and Nation, (Yale University Press) and of American Constitutional Law, (St. Martin’s Press); and editor and contributor to Constitutional Politics in the States, (Greenwood) and Federalism and Rights, (Rowman & Littlefield). He has served as an adviser on subnational constitution-making and federalism in Russia, South Africa, and Cyprus, and currently serves on the Advisory Council of the National Constitution Center.

Tembeckjian, Robert

Administrator and Counsel, New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct

Mr. Tembeckjian participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Tembeckjian is a graduate of Syracuse University, the Fordham University School of Law and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, where he earned a Masters in Public Administration. He was a Fullbright Scholar to Armenia in 1994, teaching graduate courses and lecturing on constitutional law and ethics at the American University of Armenia and Yerevan State University. Mr. Tembeckjian served on the Advisory Committee to the American Bar Association Commission to Evaluate the Model Code of Judicial Conduct from 2003 to 2007. He is on the Board of Directors of the Association of Judicial Disciplinary Counsel, and previously served as a Trustee of the Westwood Mutual Funds and the United Nations International School, and on the Board of Directors of the Civic Education Project. Mr. Tembeckjian has served on various ethics and professional responsibility committees of the New York State and New York City Bar Associations, and he has published numerous articles in legal periodicals on judicial ethics and discipline. He is a member of the editorial board of the Justice System Journal.

Thomas, Jo

Former Reporter, The New York Times

Ms. Thomas participated in the 2009 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jo Thomas reported for The New York Times for 26 years, working as a national reporter, a foreign correspondent, and assistant national editor out of offices in New York, Washington, Miami, London, Denver. Ms. Thomas has covered stories in every state except Hawaii, and has reported from Europe, South Africa, the Caribbean, Central America, and Australia. Her specialty has been investigations, among them government death squads in Northern Ireland, cancer-causing rice in Puerto Rico, and the Olympic scandal in Salt Lake City. She led the Times’ Oklahoma City bombing investigation and covered both federal trials in Denver. She shared the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for reporting on the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks. Before joining the Times, Ms. Thomas reported for The Cincinnati Post and Times-Star, where her reports on abuses in inner city housing laws resulted in reform from the state legislature, and for The Detroit Free Press, where her expose of the underworld takeover of the steel hauling business resulted in grand jury investigations and extortion convictions for three of those involved. Her expose of plans for experimental psychosurgery on mental patients in prison resulted in a landmark legal decision banning such experimentation. Ms. Thomas has retired from Syracuse University as Associate Chancellor and Professor of Journalism, but still collaborates with Chancellor Nancy Cantor on some major speeches. She is now writing a memoir.

Tober, Steve

Former Chairman, ABA Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary

Mr. Tober participated in The Last Umpires? The News Media, the ABA, and Other Independent Voices in the Federal Judicial Confirmation Process. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Tober is the former chairman of the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary. He practices in New Hampshire and has been active in state and national bar leadership, including the New Hampshire Bar Association, the New Hampshire Trial Lawyers Association, and the Association of Trial Lawyers of America. Mr. Tober has twice received the New Hampshire Bar Association’s President’s Distinguished Service Award, served as a member of the New Hampshire Supreme Court’s Board of Bar Examiners, and is a Fellow of the International Academy of Trial Layers, the American Bar Foundation (Eastern regional chair), and the New Hampshire Bar Foundation. Mr. Tober is a graduate of Syracuse University College of Law.

Toobin, Jeffrey

Legal Analyst, CNN

Mr. Toobin participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Jeffrey Toobin is a staff writer at The New Yorker, where he has covered legal affairs for the magazine since 1993. Mr. Toobin is also a legal analyst for CNN. He joined CNN in 2002 from ABC News. At The New Yorker, Mr. Toobin has written articles on such subjects as Attorney General John Ashcroft, the 2001 dispute over Florida’s votes for president, the Paula Jones sexual harassment case, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and the trial of Timothy McVeigh. Previously, Mr. Toobin served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn. He also served as an associate counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel Lawrence E. Walsh, an experience that provided the basis for his first book, Opening Arguments: A Young Lawyer’s First Case–United States v. Oliver North. Mr. Toobin has written several critically acclaimed, best-selling books, including A Vast Conspiracy: The Real Story of the Sex Scandal that Nearly Brought Down a President; The Run of His Life: The People v. O.J. Simpson; and Too Close to Call: The 36-Day Battle to Decide the 2000 Election. Mr. Toobin earned his Bachelor’s degree from Harvard College and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of Harvard Law Review.

Totenberg, Nina

Legal Affairs Correspondent, NPR

Ms. Totenberg participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

In 1991, Nina Totenberg’s ground-breaking report about University of Oklahoma Law Professor Anita Hill’s allegations of sexual harassment by Judge Clarence Thomas led the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas’ Supreme Court confirmation hearings to consider Hill’s charges. NPR received the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award for its gavel-to-gavel coverage–anchored by Ms. Totenberg–of both the original hearings and the inquiry into Anita Hill’s allegations, and for Ms. Totenberg’s reports and exclusive interview with Hill.

Ms. Totenberg was named Broadcaster of the Year and honored with the 1998 Sol Taishoff Award for Excellence in Broadcasting from the National Press Foundation. She is the first radio journalist to receive the award. She is also the recipient of the American Judicature Society’s first-ever award honoring a career body of work in the field of journalism and the law. In 1988, Ms. Totenberg won the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for her coverage of Supreme Court nominations. The jurors of the award stated, “Ms. Totenberg broke the story of Judge (Douglas) Ginsburg’s use of marijuana, raising issues of changing social values and credibility with careful perspective under deadline pressure.”

Ms. Totenberg has been honored seven times by the American Bar Association for continued excellence in legal reporting and has received a number of honorary degrees.

A frequent contributor to major newspapers and periodicals, she has published articles in The New York Times Magazine, Harvard Law Review, The Christian Science Monitor, Parade Magazine, New York Magazine, and others.

Before joining NPR in 1975, Ms. Totenberg served as Washington editor of New Times Magazine, and before that she was the legal affairs correspondent for The National Observer.

Walker, Jr., John M.

Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

Judge Walker participated in Bench Press: The Collision of Media, Politics, Public Pressure, and an Independent Judiciary. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

At the time of his appointment to the Second Circuit in 1989, Judge John M. Walker, Jr. was a United States District Judge in the Southern District of New York. Judge Walker received his B.A. degree from Yale University in 1962, and his J.D. degree from the University of Michigan Law School in 1966. Judge Walker served in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves from 1963 until 1967. He was State Counsel to the Republic of Botswana under the aegis of an Africa-Asia Public Service Fellowship, a private law practitioner in New York from 1969 to 1970, and an Assistant United States Attorney in the Criminal Division, Southern District of New York. In 1975 he returned to private law practice with the New York firm of Carter, Ledyard & Milburn, where he became a partner. In 1981 Judge Walker became Assistant Secretary of the Treasury. Judge Walker remained in this position until 1985, when he became a United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York. Judge Walker has served as Special Counsel to the U.S. Administrative Conference, president of the Federal Judges’ Association, and member of the Budget Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. He has been a Visiting Lecturer at Yale Law School since 2000, an Adjunct Professor at NYU Law School since 1996, and Director and on the faculty of NYU Law School’s Institute of Judicial Administration and Appellate Judges Seminar since 1992. Judge Walker has also been a Director of the U.S. Association of Constitutional Law since 1997. Judge Walker is married with a daughter and three stepsons.

Weisenfeld, David

Editor-in-Chief, LAWCAST

Mr. Weisenfeld participated in the 2011 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

David Weisenfeld has covered the U.S. Supreme Court since 1998, and also serves as Editor-in-Chief of LAWCAST, a nationwide NPR-style legal news service. Mr. Weisenfeld has reported on an host of high-profile Supreme Court decisions, including landmark ruling involving the use of affirmative action by universities; the Pledge of Allegiance; Bush v. Gore; sexual harassment; and the controversial Citizens United case. At LAWCAST, Mr. Weisenfeld co-anchors all of the company’s newscasts, and supervises its programming content. In his work, Mr. Weisenfeld has attended more than 200 oral arguments at the nation’s highest court. In addition, he has interviewed from U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson, Seth Waxman, and Walter Dellinger, as well as other leading Supreme Court advocates. Mr. Weisenfeld has been honored by the New Jersey Society of Professional Journalists for his work, and has appeared on the Comcast Television Network on the show, “It’s Your Call with Lynn Doyle” to discuss the Supreme Court confirmation process.

Mr. Weisenfeld has taught communications law as an adjunct professor at Rider University in Lawrenceville, N.J.  He has briefed members of Princeton University general counsel’s office about selected Supreme Court cases, and delivered lectures about the Court to students at the College of New Jersey, Rowan University, and Syracuse University College of Law. Prior to joining LAWCAST, Mr. Weisenfeld worked as an assistant news editor at the Courtroom Television Network in New York, and as a sportswriter for USA Today and The Washington Times. His work has also appeared in Employee Rights Quarterly.

White, Penny

Interim Director of the Center for Advocacy and Associate Professor of Law, University of Tennessee

Professor White participated in The Media’s Effect on Judicial Independence: A Kaleidoscopic View. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Before joining the faculty at the University of Tennessee College of Law in 2000, Professor Penny White served as a judge in all courts of record in the state of Tennessee. As a circuit judge, Professor White presided over civil and criminal jury trials in Tennessee’s First Judicial District. Thereafter, as a member of the Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals, Professor White heard and decided hundreds of cases involving state and federal constitutional law issues and state criminal law issues. As the youngest member of the Tennessee Supreme Court, Professor White participated in several decisions that have impacted Tennessee law, including decisions involving class actions, rights of tort victims, and capital punishment. Since leaving the bench, Professor White has authored benchbooks for Tennessee Circuit, General Sessions, and Municipal Court Judges; has taught judicial education programs in 38 states; and has spoken and written frequently on the topic of judicial independence. She has served as a member of the faculty at the National Judicial College for 15 years where she teaches courses for judges on the subjects of evidence, criminal procedure, and judicial ethics. She recently completed a one-year term as Chair of the Faculty Council at the National Judicial College.  In addition, Professor White has served as one of the faculty on the College’s Capital Punishment Improvement Initiative, a project that provides training and education to trial judges on the trial of capital cases.  Professor White is also authoring portions of a Capital Improvement Initiative Manual, which will be used by judges all across the country who try capital cases.

Before taking the bench in 1990, Professor White practiced law in state and federal court, successfully arguing a case, as a solo practitioner, in the United States Supreme Court in 1988. Professor White taught at three other law schools before joining the University of Tennessee faculty, serving as Director of the Virginia Capital Case Clearinghouse while teaching at Washington and Lee College of Law, holding the William J. Maier, Jr. Chair of Law at West Virginia College of Law, teaching at Denver University College of Law, and visiting at the University of North Carolina School of Law. Her work has been published in numerous law reviews and legal publications.

Wimmer, Kurt

Partner, Covington & Burling, LLP

Mr. Wimmer participated in the 2010 Law, Politics, and the Media Lecture Series. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Kurt Wimmer is a partner concentrating in media law and intellectual property at the Washington, D.C. firm Covington & Burling, LLP. Mr. Wimmer’s practice focuses on representing companies in the digital media, television, mobile, publication, and new technology sectors. His work includes intellectual property protection and strategy, content liability and newsgathering advice and litigation, television and digital content licensing transactions, privacy and data protection, international law, and public policy representation of companies and associations before Congress, the Federal Communications Commission, and international government entities. From 2006 to 2009, he was Senior Vice President and General Counsel of Gannett Co., Inc. and he was Managing Partner of Covington’s London office from 2000-2003. Mr. Wimmer’s clients have included Microsoft, Yahoo!, The Washington Post Company, Newsweek, National Geographic, and Gannett Co., Inc. He also has advised journalists, associations, and legislators in more than two dozen countries concerning new media laws, protection of journalists, and freedom of information. He is on the boards of the Media Law Resource Center, The Media Institute, the ABA Forum on Communications Law, and the Citizens Media Law Project of the Berkman Center at Harvard University.

Wittes, Benjamin

Fellow and Research Director of Public Law, Brookings Institution

Mr. Wittes participated in Supreme Makeover: Inventing a New Model of Judicial Openness on the High Court. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Mr. Wittes is also a columnist for The New Republic Online and contributing editor for The Atlantic Monthly. He is the author of Starr: A Reassessment (Yale University Press, 2002) and Confirmation Wars: Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times (2006, Rowman & Littlefield, Hoover Institution). Mr. Wittes was an editorial writer at The Washington Post from 1997 to 2006, specializing in legal affairs. He previously covered the Justice Department and federal regulatory agencies as a reporter and news editor at Legal Times. His writing has appeared in a wide range of journals and magazines.

Wu, Timothy

Professor of Law, Columbia Law School

Professor Wu participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Tim Wu is the co-author of Who Controls the Internet? (Oxford U. Press 2006), and a writer for Slate Magazine. In 2006 Mr. Wu was recognized as one 50 leaders in science and technology by Scientific American magazine for his work on Network Neutrality theory. Mr. Wu previously worked for Riverstone Networks in the telecommunications industry in Silicon Valley, and was a law clerk for Judge Richard Posner and Justice Stephen Breyer. He graduated from McGill University with a Bachelor’s in Science, and Harvard Law School, and has taught at the University of Virginia, the University of Chicago, and Stanford Law School. Mr. Wu has written for various legal publications, as well as The Washington Post, Forbes Magazine, Slate Magazine, Playboy, and others. He is on the advisory board of Free Press, Public Knowledge, is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and once worked at Hoo’s Dumplings.

Zollers, Frances

Professor of Law and Public Policy, Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University

Professor Zollers participated in Creators vs. Consumers: The Rhetoric, Reality, and Reformation of Intellectual Property Law and Policy. Please visit our event archives for more information about this event.

Professor Zollers’ research interests are intellectual property, business-government relations, and product liability and safety. She has held an appointment as a visiting scholar at the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, as well as visiting professorships at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the Kelly School of Business at Indiana University, and the University of Michigan Business School. Some of her publications include:  “No More Soft Landings for Software: Liability for Defects in An Industry That Has Come of Age,” 21 Santa Clara Computer & High Technology Law Journal 745 (2005) (with McMullin, A., Hurd, S.N., and Shears, P.); “The European Food Safety Authority: Towards Coherence in Food Safety Policy and Practice,” 106 The British Food Journal 336 (2004) (with Shears, P., and Hurd, S.N.); and “Workplace Violence and Security: Are There Lessons for Peacemaking?” 36 Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law (2003), 449 (with E. Callahan). Professor Zollers earned her law degree from the Syracuse University College of Law.