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October 2017

News

Local Domestic Violence Group Honors Life and Legacy of Liz Whipple

The Domestic Violence Task Force of Tuscaloosa County dedicated a handmade bench on October 4 to The University of Alabama School of Law in memory of Liz Whipple, who passed away in April.

Whipple served as the interim director of the School of Law’s Domestic Violence Clinic and chairperson of the Domestic Violence Task Force of Tuscaloosa for two years. A 2007 graduate of Alabama Law, she had been a student during the first year of the Domestic Violence Clinic. The bench will be placed in the room where Whipple worked on cases as a student and where she taught as a clinical professor.

Law School Selects Two for Profiles in Service 

The University of Alabama School of Law is pleased to announce Joseph Levin and Liz Whipple have been named the 2017 Profiles in Service.

A 1966 graduate of the University of Alabama School of Law, Levin is co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center. From 1971 until 2004, he served the Center in various capacities, including Legal Director, Chair of the Board, President & CEO, and General Counsel, retiring in 2016. He continues to serve the Center as an emeritus member of the board.

Whipple was a 2007 graduate of the University of Alabama School of Law, and during her 10-year legal career, she made an enormous impact on the lives of those around her. In 2015, she accepted a two-year appointment as Interim Director of the Domestic Violence Clinic. Whipple had been among the first students to participate in the DV Clinic when it began, so it was fitting that she would return to lead the clinic and educate future advocates. During her time in Tuscaloosa, she chaired the Tuscaloosa Domestic Violence Task Force, served on the board of the local women’s shelter, and assisted in training law enforcement on issues of domestic violence.

Each year during Pro Bono Celebration Month, which is recognized nationally in October, the
Law School honors outstanding alumni who have made significant contributions to public service.

Thirty-First Commandant of Marines Visits Alabama Law

General Charles Krulak, former commandant of the United States Marine Corps, visited Alabama Law Sept. 13.

Krulak discussed his military experience, which includes time as a platoon commander in Vietnam and the Gulf War, and his four years as the 31st Commandant of the Marines. Krulak also served as CEO of MBNA Europe and as non-executive director of Aston Villa, an English-league soccer club. The event was sponsored by the UA Military Law Society.

Class Notes

Hansen Babington (’14) has joined Maynard Cooper & Gale as an Associate in the firm’s Corporate Section in Birmingham.

Jeffrey Beaverstock (’98) has been nominated by President Donald Trump to serve as District Judge on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama.

Jacob Burchfield (’17) has joined Burr & Forman as an Associate in the firm’s General Commercial Litigation Practice Group in Birmingham.

Samuel H. Franklin (’72) has been installed as the 68th President of the American College of Trial Lawyers. Franklin also was named a National Law Journal Elite Boutique Trailblazer for 2017.

Madeleine S. Greskovich (‘17) has joined Starnes Davis Florie as an Associate in Medical Malpractice Defense in Birmingham.

Kimberly L. Hager (’97) has joined Maynard Cooper & Gale as a Shareholder in the firm’s Corporate Section in Birmingham.

Timothy Lewis (‘84)  received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the Library School Association of the School of Library and Information Studies at The University of Alabama.

Michel M. Marcoux (’08) has joined Maynard Cooper & Gale as a Shareholder in the firm’s Corporate Section in Birmingham.

Emily Coody Marks (’98) has been nominated by President Donald Trump to serve as District Judge in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama.

Terry F. Moorer (’86) has been nominated by President Donald Trump as District Judge in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama.

Lane Morrison (’15) was recognized by the Birmingham Bar Association’s Volunteer Lawyers Program for pro bono work in resolving a landlord-tenant dispute.

Charles A. Powell (’92) has been named by The Best Lawyers in America 2018 as Lawyer of the Year within his practice of labor and employment law at Littler in Birmingham.

Vishal Shah (’13) has joined the Labor and Employment Group at Morgan Lewis in the firm’s Philadelphia office.

Mike Ward (’02) has been named Deputy Director of Athletics at Elon University in Elon, North Carolina.

Gifts

Alan Irwin Franco contributed $5,000 to the Abraham Franco Fund. The Franco Fund supports student scholarships.

Colonel Jack Charles Dixon, Jr. (’48) donated $5,000 to the Unrestricted Fund.

Faculty Notes

PROFESSOR RICHARD DELGADO published Rodrigo’s Footnote: Multi-Group Oppression and a Theory of Judicial Review,” in the UC-Davis Law Review.

He and Professor Jean Stefancic submitted their manuscript, Must We Defend Nazis:  Why the First Amendment Should Not Protect Hate Speech and White Supremacy, to NYU Press.

The administrators of SSRN (Social Science Research Network) once again notified Professor Delgado that he is in the top 10% of authors on the website by all-time downloads.

A book in his and Stefancic’s Critical Educator series (Taylor & Francis/Routledge) won a second national award.  The book is Sara M. Childers, Urban Educational Identity:  Seeing Children on Their Own Terms (2017), which won the American Educational Studies Association Critics Choice Award.

PROFESSOR PAUL HORWITZ served as co-organizer of a symposium on The Ethics of Legal Scholarship, along with Professors Chad Oldfather (Marquette) and Carissa Byrne Hessick (North Carolina). Along with such noted scholars in the field as Robin West, Stanley Fish, and Neil Hamilton, Horwitz and his co-organizers are drafting a set of proposed principles of ethical legal scholarship. That document, along with contributions by Horwitz and others, will be published in a forthcoming issue of the Marquette Law Review. Professor Horwitz was quoted in a recent Washington Post story on religious tests and judicial nominees.

PROFESSOR DAN JOYNER gave a presentation on U.S. options for dealing with North Korea on a panel at a conference on advanced operational law at the U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), Offutt Air Force Base (Omaha, Nebraska).

PROFESSOR RON KROTOSZYNSKI, JR. spoke on “The Interrelation Between Privacy and Free Expression,” at a symposium considering “International Perspectives on Privacy and Free Expression:  Concepts, Conflicts, Consequences,” organized by the University of Michigan Law School, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on September 22, 2017.  On September 21, 2017, he presented, “Shedding Their Constitutional Rights at the Schoolhouse Gate:  The Decline of Freedom of Speech for Students and Teachers in the Nation’s Public Schools, Colleges, and Universities,” at a faculty/student workshop sponsored by the editors of the Michigan Law Review, also in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  On September 15, 2017, Professor Krotoszynski presented “Coming Attractions and Prognostications:  A Preview of the Supreme Court’s Coming October 2017 Term (with Particular Attention to the Potential Impact of a New Justice),” to a joint meeting of the Board of Directors of the Law School Foundation and the Board of Trustees of the Farrah Law Alumni Society, in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

PROFESSOR KENNETH ROSEN traveled to Prattville, Alabama, to attend a law clerk reunion with Eleventh Circuit Chief Judge Ed Carnes of the U.S. Court of Appeals.  The reunion included numerous University of Alabama graduates who have clerked for Chief Judge Carnes.  Professor Rosen traveled to the University of Toronto in Canada to participate in the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Law and Economics Association.

PROFESSOR JEAN STEFANCIC and Professor Richard Delgado submitted the final copyedit for Must We Defend Nazis: Why the First Amendment Should Not Protect Hate Speech and White Supremacy, New Edition, to be fast-tracked for publication by NYU Press in January 2018. Professor Stefancic is currently in the top 10% of Authors on SSRN by all-time downloads.

PROFESSOR FRED VARS’s article on the impact of waiting periods to purchase handguns was accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed Economic Journal, a top economics journal in the U.K.

The views, opinions, and conclusions expressed by faculty in their publications or research activities are those of the author and not necessarily those of The University of Alabama or its officers and trustees. The content of faculty publications has not been approved by the University of Alabama, and the author is solely responsible for that content.