School of Law

Nelson S. “Strobe” Talbott, president of the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., and former deputy secretary of state from 1995-2001, delivered the keynote address during the Washington University School of Law diploma ceremony on Friday, May 21, in Mudd Field.

Sadena Thevarajah feels that the best way to address health-care inequality is to become an attorney. Another step toward that journey will be complete May 21 when Thevarajah, the Record‘s 2010 Outstanding Graduate in the School of Law, receives her juris doctorate from WUSTL.

Peter K. Cramer, PhD, has been named new assistant dean of graduate programs in the School of Law at Washington University in St. Louis. His duties include coordinating recruitment, admissions and placement of the law school’s graduate programs and for the day-to-day operations of those programs. This summer, the law school is launching a new executive LLM program co-taught by law faculty at WUSTL and Korea University. 

Washington University School of Law’s Civil Justice Clinic, partnering with Legal Services of Eastern Missouri (LSEM), has reached a settlement with the Saint Louis Public Schools (SLPS) in a federal lawsuit that challenged the appropriateness and constitutionality of recent disciplinary practices for two high school students.

Washington University in St. Louis School of Law celebrated the outstanding achievements of six individuals at the annual Distinguished Alumni Awards Dinner April 9 in the Crowder Courtyard of Anheuser-Busch Hall.

“The retirement announcement of Justice John Paul Stevens does not come as a big surprise, but it is still a sad day,” says Gregory P. Magarian, JD, former Stevens clerk and professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “The Supreme Court is losing a great jurist and a great man.” Magarian calls Stevens a “pragmatic populist” because of the way he approached his decisions with the court. “Stevens always has been very focused on what a Supreme Court decision is going to do to an ordinary person,” he says. “He’s never written an opinion just to make a point or put on a show.” 

The School of Law’s Tyrrell Williams Lecture will be delivered by His Excellency Thomas Buergenthal, JD, the United States judge on the International Court of Justice in the Hague. The lecture, “The International Judicial System: Its Growing Influence,” will take place at 4 p.m. Thursday, April 8, in the Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom in Anheuser-Busch Hall.

Leading experts will convene for a discussion panel on “Labor and Migration Effects of Human Trafficking” at 4 p.m. Wednesday, April 7, in the Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom of Anheuser-Busch Hall. The panel, hosted by the Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Work and Social Capital, is co-sponsored by the Law & Culture Initiative and is free and open to the public.

Mae Quinn, JD, professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis says drug courts may not be as effective as claimed. “In their zeal to solve problems plaguing our communities, today’s court reformers often overlook important concerns of individual defendants — including their rights to due process of law and zealous representation,” Quinn says.

The School of Law’s Clinical Legal Education Program will host its 10th annual “Access to Equal Justice Colloquium: Challenging Structural Impediments to Substantive Justice” Friday, March 19 in the Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom in Anheuser-Busch Hall. The event is free and open to the public but registration is required.