2007 - 2008 AJS Board of Directors
Honorable John R. Tunheim
President
Judge Tunheim is a U.S. District Judge for the District of Minnesota. Prior to his appointment in 1995, he served nine years as chief deputy attorney general in the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office, where he supervised and directed all operations of the office. He also served as Minnesota solicitor general and manager of the Attorney General’s Public Affairs Litigation Division. He spent three years in private litigation practice with the St. Paul law firm of Oppenheimer, Wolf, Foster, Shepard and Donnelly and served as law clerk to senior U.S. District Judge Earl Larson in Minneapolis. He also was a staff assistant to U.S. Senator Hubert H. Humphrey. Tunheim chaired the U.S. Assassination Records Review Board, an independent federal agency responsible for ensuring and facilitating the review and public disclosure of government records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. He is currently Chair of the U.S. Judicial Conference Committee on Court Administration and Case Management., a committee with broad jurisdiction for making policy recommendations for the federal judiciary.
He is a member of the American Bar Association and a former chair and member of the Council of the ABA Division on Government and Public Sector Lawyers, a division he helped establish in 1991, and serves on the Division’s Council of Fellows. He also serves as the Division’s representative in the ABA House of Delegates. In addition, he is Chair of the Standards Task Force on the Prosecution and Defense Function, an ABA task force that is responsible for revising the standards governing prosecutors and defense lawyers in criminal matters; a member of the ABA House of Delegates Committee on Drafting; a member of the Council for the National Conference of Federal Trial Judges in the ABA Judicial Division; and serves on the ABA Advisory Committee to the Standing Committee on Election Law. He also served a two-year term as co-chair of the Public Law Section of the Minnesota State Bar Association, a section he helped to establish.
Hon. John R. Tunheim served for six years as a member of the Board of Advisors to the ABA Central European and Eurasian Law Initiative and has worked extensively on rule of law and election issues in central and eastern Europe and in Central Asia. He has worked on many projects in Kosovo assisting the United Nations in developing a judicial system. He has also taught at several Justice Department conferences on criminal procedure and trial skills in Hungary, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan.
He is on the Board of Directors of both the University of Minnesota Law School Board of Visitors and the Minnesota Chapter of the Federal Bar Association; a member of the Douglas K. Amdahl Inn of Court; and President of the Norwegian-American Historical Association and a member of the Executive Committee of the Norwegian Nobel Prize Forum. Judge Tunheim graduated from Concordia College in Moorhead, MN, and is a graduate of the University of Minnesota Law School, where he served as president of the Minnesota Law Review.
Honorable
Gordon L. Doerfer (Ret.)
President-Elect
Doerfer is a retired as associate justice of the Massachusetts Appeals Court. He also served for many years as an associate justice of the Superior Court and the Boston Municipal Court. He is currently on the panel of neutrals at JAMS in Boston engaged in mediation and arbitration. He was an associate at the firm Nutter, McClennan & Fish and a partner at the firm Palmer & Dodge specializing in civil litigation. Doerfer was an instructor at Boston College Law School from 1974 to 1977 and has taught trial advocacy at Suffolk Law School since 1994. He is a member of the American Law Institute, and served on various committees of the Superior Court including its ADR Committee (of which he was chair), the executive committee, and committees on long range planning and automation. He has also served as chair of the Administration of Justice Committee of the Boston Bar Association and president of the Boston Inn of Court. He is a trustee of the Flaschner Judicial Institute and served as a trustee of the Massachusetts Bar Foundation. He has published in the area of arbitration, equity practice, trade secrets and the conduct and management of trials. He has served on the board of editors of the Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly and is a frequent participant in various continuing legal education programs and other bar-related activities. Doerfer received his B.A. from Amherst College and his J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Dennis Courtland Hayes
Vice President
Mr. Hayes presently serves as Interim President & CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). His regular duties as general counsel and Corporation Secretary entail legal representation of the organization, its board of directors, 400,000 members and one thousand- plus affiliate units across America. He also directs the organization's legal programs in all areas, including voting, housing, employment, and education. Previous to joining the NAACP, Hayes maintained a private law practice in Indianapolis, Indiana, specializing in civil rights laws. He graduated from Indiana University, Bloomington (BS) and Indiana University School of Law at Indianapolis (JD) and currently serves as a director of the Public Justice Center in Baltimore, Maryland and is a member of the Indiana University School of Education's Board of Visitors.
George W. Madison
Vice President
George W. Madison is Executive Vice President and General Counsel of TIAA-CREF and a member of its Executive Management Team. Mr. Madison joined the company in 2003, after six and a half years as executive vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary at Comerica Incorporated, where he also served as a member of Comerica’s management policy committee and management council. Mr. Madison was previously a partner in the law firm of Mayer, Brown & Platt in New York (currently known as Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw), practicing banking and structured finance law on behalf of foreign and domestic money center banks. Before joining Mayer, Brown & Platt in 1987, Mr. Madison was an associate with the law firm of Shearman & Sterling in New York. He also served as law clerk to the Honorable Nathaniel R. Jones at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati. Mr. Madison is a member of the American Bar Association, the American Law Institute, the American Judicature Society and the Association of Corporate Counsel. He currently serves as chair of the American Bar Association’s Committee of Corporate General Counsel and is on the Executive Committee of The Association of the Bar of the City of New York. He has recently been elected to the Board of Directors for The Legal Aid Society. Mr. Madison received the Judge Learned Hand Award from the American Jewish Committee. He is also the recipient of the NAACP’s 1997 Invaluable Pro Bono Legal Services Award, the MCCA’s 1998 Diversity 2000 Award, the Detroit Metropolitan Bar Association’s 2003 Distinguished Service Award, and the 2003 State Bar of Michigan’s President’s Choice Award. Most recently, Mr. Madison was awarded the 2006 Paul Robeson Distinguished Alumni Award from Columbia Law School. Mr. Madison holds a B.S. from New York University’s Stern School of Business, a J.D. from Columbia Law School and an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School.
William D. Johnston
Chair of the National Advisory Council
Johnston is a partner in the Wilmington, Delaware offices of Young, Conaway, Stargatt & Taylor LLP. His practice concentration is corporate and other business counseling and litigation. He is the immediate past chair of the Indemnification and Insurance Subcommittee of the ABA Business Law Section’s Business and Corporate Litigation Committee. He is a member of the governing council of the Corporate Counsel Section of the Delaware State Bar Association, and he is State Bar Delegate to the ABA House of Delegates. Johnston is a graduate of Colgate University and the Washington & Lee University School of Law. He clerked for the Honorable Daniel L. Herrmann, chief justice of the Delaware Supreme Court. He has served as a member of the Permanent Advisory Committee on Supreme Court Rules, and as editor of Delaware’s first Appellate Handbook. Johnston is a past president of the Delaware State Bar Association. He was the first chair of the Bar Association’s Pro Se Litigation Assistance Committee, and he was reappointed as chair of the Committee. He was a member of the team from Delaware which attended the National Conference on Pro Se Litigation co-sponsored by AJS in 1999. He is serving in his twentieth year as a member of the Delaware Human Relations Commission. He has served as vice chair and acting chair of the Commission, and he remains active as a member of the Commission’s executive committee.
Belsky is the Dean-designate and will become the Dean of the University of Akron School of Law in January of 2008. From 1995 to 2007, he served as Dean and then Professor of Law at the University of Tulsa College of Law. Belsky is a graduate of Temple University, College of Liberal Arts with a B.A., cum laude; Columbia University School of Law cum laude; Hague Academy of International Law; and the Cambridge University Institute of Criminology. Belsky was dean and professor of law at Albany Law School. From 1969 to 1974, Belsky served first as an assistant district attorney and then as chief prosecutor in Philadelphia. From 1975 to 1978, he served both as counsel to the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives and as chief counsel to the Special House Committee on the Outer Continental Shelf (offshore drilling). From 1979 to 1982 Belsky served first as deputy general counsel and then assistant administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. From 1982 to 1986, Belsky was associate professor of law and director of the Center for Governmental Responsibility at the University of Florida. Belsky has served as board member and committee chair of many civic and charitable organizations, including bar associations in Philadelphia, New York, and Oklahoma; the American Law Institute; the Appleseed Foundation; Oklahoma Academy; the Child Abuse Network; Heritage Academy; the Fenster Museum; the Urban League; the Albany and Tulsa Jewish Federations; National Conference for Community Justice (NCCJ); and the Anti-Defamation League. Belsky has helped organize and participated in numerous conferences on criminal and civil justice, the administration of justice, judicial independence, ethics, international law, the U.S. Supreme Court, environmental law, and religious understanding. He has written numerous articles and books on the administration of justice, civil rights, constitutional law, criminal law, international law, environmental law, ocean and coastal law, and professional responsibility.
Carole Wagner Vallianos
Treasurer
Vallianos is a principal in the Law Offices of Carole Wagner Vallianos. She practices civil rights, nonprofit corporation law, and estate planning. She was reappointed to the California Judicial Council’s Standing Committee on Access and Fairness in the Courts and is a past member of the Jury Improvement Task Force, and the Council’s Advisory Committees on Race and Ethics Bias in the Courts and Private Judging. Vallianos is a Fellow of the California First Amendment Coalition and was an advisory board member of the Citizen Access Project, University of Florida’s Brechner Center for Freedom of Information and a vice president of the Coalition for Justice. She is also a member of Women Lawyers of Los Angeles, the South Bay Bar Association, and the Benjamin Aranda III Inn of Court. Vallianos is currently serving as Chair of the Board of Los Angeles BioMedical (LABioMed) Research Institute at Harbor-UCLA. She is past president of the League of Women Voters of California, and she was on the Board of Directors of the League of Women Voters of the United States and the Board of Trustees of the League of Women Voters Education Fund. She has served as an NGO/nonprofit consultant with the U.S. Department of State in Bosnia, Turkey, Cyprus and India. She is a graduate of Coro, a public policy training program and is a member of Pacific Council on International Policy. Vallianos received her B.A. from California State University, Fullerton, and her J.D. from Southwestern University School of Law.
Dwight D.
Opperman
Distinguished Lifetime Director
The former chairman and CEO of West Publishing Company. He joined the American Judicature Society Board of Directors in 1974 and served on the Executive Committee as Vice President. He received a Herbert Harley Award in 1984, helped to establish the Edward J. Devitt Distinguished Service to Justice Award in 1982 and received the AJS Justice Award in 1992. In 2006 he was bestowed with the honor of Distinguished Lifetime Director.
Neal Sonnett
Immediate Past
President
Sonnett is a lawyer who heads his own Miami law firm specializing in the defense of corporate, white collar, and complex criminal cases. Sonnett has been profiled by the National Law Journal as one of the “Nation’s Top Litigators;” one of the nation’s top white collar criminal defense lawyers; and one of the 100 most influential lawyers in America; and is one of an elite group of lawyers selected for every edition of The Best Lawyers in America. Sonnett, a former assistant U.S. attorney and chief of the Criminal Division for the Southern District of Florida, is a past chair of the ABA Criminal Justice Section; serves in the ABA House of Delegates and on the Executive Council of the Section of Individual Rights & Responsibilities; chairs the ABA Task Force on Treatment of Enemy Combatants; is a member of the ABA Task Force on Gatekeeper Regulation and the Profession; and previously served as chair of the ABA Committee on Criminal Justice Improvements. Sonnett serves as president of the National Foundation for Criminal Justice and is a past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Florida Bar Foundation, the Florida Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Dade County Bar Association, the South Florida Chapter of the Federal Bar Association, and the Spellman-Hoeveler American Inn of Court. Sonnett is a graduate of the University of Miami School of Law.
Talbot "Sandy" D'Alemberte
Past President
D’Alemberte, special counsel to Hunton &
Williams, was elected to serve as Chair of the Board for AJS in August 2005.
D’Alemberte is president emeritus of Florida State University, serving as
president from 1994 to 2003. He served as dean of the FSU College of Law from
1984 to 1989 and still serves as professor emeritus. D’Alemberte represented Miami-Dade County in the Florida House of
Representatives from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s. He was previously
president of AJS from 1982-1984 and also president of the American Bar
Association from 1991 to 1992. D’Alemberte’s practice focuses on the representation of clients in providing
strategic assistance on large-scale litigation throughout the United States;
mediation and arbitration and internal investigations for corporations, as well
as trial and appellate counsel, in both civil and criminal matters.
In 1996 AJS awarded D’Alemberte its highest honor, the Justice Award. This year
he was honored by the ABA with the CEELI Volunteer Award. Other honors
D’Alemberte has received include the 2003 ABA Medal, 2001 Wickersham Award given
by the Friends of the Law Library of Congress, and 1993 Florida Academy of
Criminal Defense Lawyers Annual Criminal Justice Award.
Other members of the Board:
Honorable Kevin S. Burke
Burke was appointed to the Hennepin County District Court in 1984 and is currently the chief judge. Previous to his appointment, Burke was a partner at Chestnut & Brooks law firm. He has also worked as an assistant public defender for the Hennepin County Public Defenders Office. Burke is an adjunct faculty member of the law schools at both the University of Minnesota and the University of St. Thomas. He is currently on the board of directors for the American Judges Association, and he serves on the Research Advisory Committee for the National Center for State Courts. Burke received his B.A. from the University of Minnesota in political science and his J.D. from the University of Minnesota Law School. Burke recently received the William J. Rehnquist Award for Judicial Excellence from the National Center for State Courts. It is one of the nation’s highest judicial honors and recognizes a state judge who shows the highest standards in leadership and judicial excellence.
Judge Carroll is Dean and Ethel P. Malugen Professor of Law at the Cumberland School of Law, Samford University, Birmingham, Alabama where he teaches Federal Courts, Complex Litigation and an on-line course in E-Discovery and Evidence. He received his undergraduate degree from Tufts University and holds law degrees from the Cumberland School of Law at Samford University (J.D.)(Magna Cum Laude) and Harvard University (LL.M.). Judge Carroll served as a United States Magistrate Judge in the Middle District of Alabama for over 14 years. He is a former member of the United States Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and is former chair of its Discovery Subcommittee. He was also the chair of the Magistrate Judges’ Education Committee of the Federal Judicial Center. Prior to becoming a judge, Judge Carroll was a Professor of Law at Mercer University School of Law in Macon, Georgia. Prior to entering academia, he was the Legal Director of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama. His trial experience included major civil rights class action litigation and complex criminal defense including a substantial number of death penalty cases. He has twice argued before the United States Supreme Court. Judge Carroll also has combat military service in the United States Marine Corps. Judge Carroll is a frequent lecturer and speaker at national seminars on the subject of the discovery of electronic materials and other topics relating to federal courts. His most recent publications are “Developments in the Law of Electronic Discovery”, 27 Am. J.Trial Advoc. 357 (2003) and “Preservation of Documents in the Electronic Age - What Should Courts Do?” which appears in the 2005 Federal Courts Law Review (www.fclr.org) at 5. He is also active in many community organizations such as the Gift of Life Foundation, the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, the United Way and Leadership Alabama. He was a 1996 Community Hero Olympic Torch Bearer. His hobby is doing triathlons, duathlons and marathons. He has been married to Susan for 35 years and they have a daughter named Catherine. Catherine is the data and evaluation coordinator for the Southeastern Aids Training Consortium at Emory University Medical School.
Cazimero is owner of Graphic House, a design company she established in 1972. Her award-winning company has serviced significant corporate clients over the years. She completed a 6-year term on the Judicial Selection Commission in 1987, two as vice chair, and continues to serve the judiciary in various positions. She is currently vice chair of the AJS/Hawaií Chapter and is on the Judicial Evaluation Panel. She has served on a number of AJS committees, including the Committee on Unpublished Opinions, and the Selection and Retention Committee. Active in community organizations, she serves on the boards of the Friends of Hawaii Charities, the Hawaií Convention and Visitors Bureau (HVCB), Queen’s Health Systems, Queen’s Medical Center, the Queen Emma Foundation, and the Hawaii Consortium for the Arts. She served on the Board of Regents of the University of Hawaii (UH) and the UH Foundation. She is a current member of the University/Community Partnership and chairs the Legacy Path project that was dedicated last month at UH Manoa. Among the prestigious awards she has received are the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA) Ha’aheo Award, Kamehameha Distinguished Alumni Award, the University of Hawaii Distinguished Alumni Award, the Native Hawaiian Chamber of Commerce ‘O’O Award, and the YWCA Leadership Award.
Marla N. Greenstein is Executive Director of the Alaska Commission on Judicial Conduct, a position she has held since 1989. She previously served as senior staff attorney for the Alaska Judicial Council and as senior staff attorney for the American Judicature Society in Chicago. Ms. Greenstein served from 1996-97 as Chair of the Lawyers Conference of the American Bar Association’s Judicial Division, has served on the American Judicature Society’s Board and Executive Committee. Ms. Greenstein also serves as Secretary of the Board of the Association of Judicial Disciplinary Counsel. She is a graduate of Loyola University of Chicago School of Law and holds an undergraduate degree in American Government and Philosophy from Georgetown University. Ms. Greenstein has published articles in the areas of judicial selection and judicial discipline, including “Judicial Disqualification in Alaska Courts,” Alaska Law Review, June 2000. She serves on the Alaska Bar’s Ethics Committee and Judicial Independence Committee. Most recently, Ms. Greenstein became the first Ethics Column Editor for the American Bar Association’s Judges Journal. She has lectured widely in the area of judicial ethics and has served as faculty for international judicial ethics seminars in Micronesia and Russia. Currently she serves as co-chair for the Khabarovsk-Alaska Rule of Law Partnership.
Jon Gould is associate professor and director of the Center for Justice, Law, and Society at George Mason University, where he is a faculty member in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences and jointly appointed in the School of Law. Professor Gould’s research interests are in law and justice, with an emphasis on civil rights and liberties, judicial administration, evaluation of justice functions, and popular construction of the law. He has published two books and more than 20 articles on various subjects. His 2005 book, Speak No Evil: The Triumph of Hate Speech Regulation, was a co-winner of the Herbert Jacob award for the best book in law and society. Before joining George Mason University, Professor Gould practiced law with a Washington, D.C. firm, directed human rights programming, served as chief of staff for a college president, and worked on the national staff of two presidential campaigns. He continues to consult both domestically and abroad for governments and non-governmental organizations alike and is also chair of the Innocence Commission for Virginia. During the 2006-07 term, Professor Gould served as a U.S. Supreme Court Fellow.
Martha Hill Jamison, a native Houstonian, has served since 1999 as Judge of the 164th Judicial District Court in Harris County, Texas (the third most populous county in the United States). Since 2006, she has also served as Administrative Judge of the 25 courts in the Civil Division. Judge Jamison previously served as Civil Division Rules Committee and Chair of the Legislative Committee for the 59 district courts in all divisions.
Judge Jamison is board certified in civil trial law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. She is a member of the Court Administration Task Force of the State Bar of Texas. She is a Life Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation and a Life Fellow of the Houston Bar Foundation. Previously, she served as a board member of the College of the State Bar. She supports the Institute for Civility in Government and volunteers as a cast member for Night Court, a fundraiser for the Houston Bar Foundation. In addition to being a former Fellow of the International Academy of Mediators, Judge Jamison was a founding board member. Judge Jamison is the past president of the Houston Chapter of the Association of Attorney-Mediators. She is affiliated with the Garland Walker Inn of Court.
In addition to her legal contributions, Judge Jamison is actively involved in a number of civic organizations. She serves on both the Regional Steering Committee for Young Life and the U.S. Board of Directors for Casa MAMI Mx, an orphanage in Reynosa, Mexico. She is a Fellow of the American Leadership Forum, Class XXV. Judge Jamison is a member of St. Luke’s United Methodist Church, where she teaches adult Sunday school and Disciple Bible Studies. She has served St. Luke’s in a variety of capacities, including Lay Leader, Stewardship Chair, executive committee member, long range planning chair, board of stewards member, finance committee member, and member of St. Luke’s Disciples in Ministry. Her prior civic contributions also include serving as a KidsHope USA mentor for Woodrow Wilson Elementary School, Odyssey of the Mind Parent Leader, and American Field Service Host Family.
Judge Jamison graduated from the University of Texas in 1973, where she was selected Outstanding Woman Student and Cactus Outstanding Student, and was inducted into the Friar Society. She also served on the Texas Union Board of Directors and received the Texas Union Leadership Award. She graduated from the University of Texas School of Law in 1977.
Mumma has served as the executive director of the North Carolina Chief Justice's Criminal Justice Study Commission, which studies causation issues associated with wrongful convictions, since its inception in 2002. She is also executive director of the N.C. Center on Actual Innocence, which investigates inmate innocence claims and coordinates the work of Innocence Projects at each of North Carolina's law schools. She is an adjunct professor at University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Law, where she teaches “Wrongful Convictions” and previously taught in the research and writing program. She holds an undergraduate degree in business from UNC-Chapel Hill, and spent nine years working in corporate finance before returning to Carolina to obtain her J.D. She clerked for three years with the North Carolina appellate courts and worked with Chief Justice I. Beverly Lake— for whom she clerked—in developing the North Carolina Commission. She has three children, ages 18, 17, and 14, and is married to Mitch Mumma, a partner with a venture capital firm in Durham, N.C. Christine also serves on the boards of UNC Law School, Durham Academy, Fair Trial Initiative and Triangle Land Conservancy.
Judge Cara Lee Neville has served on the District Court of Minnesota for Hennepin County since 1986. She previously served on the AJS Board of Directors from 2001 to 2005. Prior to judicial service, she was an Assistant Public Defender for Hennepin County and worked in the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office. She has been an active leader in the American Bar Association, serving on the ABA Board of Governors and as a member of the Joint Commission to Evaluate the Model Code of Judicial Conduct, the Standing Committee on Judicial Independence, the Judges’ Advisory Committee to the Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, and the Commission on Judicial Selection Standards. Judge Neville is a past Chair of the ABA Criminal Justice Section and Minnesota State Delegate to the ABA House of Delegates. She recently completed a term as Hennepin County Bar Association delegate to the ABA House of Delegates. Judge Neville is a past President of the National Association of Women Judges. She received the Hennepin County Bar Association’s Professionalism Award in 2006 and the Minnesota State Bar Association’s Presidential Award in 2002. Neville earned her J.D. from William Mitchell School of Law.
Reinert is an Assistant Professor of Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, where he teaches classes on constitutional law, criminal law, and the rights of prisoners and detainees. He is Of Counsel to Koob & Magoolaghan, a civil rights firm specializing in prisoners’ rights, and where he practiced as an associate from 2001 until 2007. Reinert graduated magna cum laude from New York University School of Law in 1999, where he was a Root-Tilden-Kern Public Interest Scholar. After law school, Reinert clerked first for then Chief Judge Harry T. Edwards, U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and subsequently for Justice Stephen G. Breyer, Associate Justice, Supreme Court of United States. After his clerkships, Reinert studied British law in London as a Temple Bar Scholar. Reinert began working as a professor at Cardozo in July 2007.
Reno was born in 1938 in Miami, Florida. She attended Cornell University and graduated in 1960 with a degree in chemistry. In 1960, she enrolled at Harvard Law School, one of only sixteen women in a class of more than 500 students, and she received her LL.B. from Harvard in 1963. She was named staff director of the Judiciary Committee of the Florida House of Representatives in 1971, and in 1973 accepted a position with the Dade County State Attorney's Office. In 1978, after the then-serving State Attorney stepped down, she was appointed by Governor Reubin Askew as state attorney for Dade County. She was subsequently elected to this position five times. Reno was nominated by President Clinton in 1993. She was the first female attorney general of the United States, and the longest-serving attorney general in the twentieth century. She returned to her home in Miami after leaving office in 2001.
Richardson is a partner in the Los Angeles office of Kirkland & Ellis. Richardson is a 1984 graduate of Stanford Law School, where he was an articles editor on the Stanford Law Review, and a 1979 graduate of Harvard University, where he majored in government and received cum laude honors. He is an experienced civil trial attorney who has tried insurance coverage actions, contract disputes and products liability cases. In addition, he has litigated mass tort, antitrust, unfair business practices, intellectual property, and other complex business matters in federal and state courts in California and other jurisdictions. Richardson has been actively involved in pro bono activities in the Los Angeles community and beyond. In addition to serving on the AJS Board, Richardson has served as a member of the California State Bar’s Commission on Access to Justice, a member of the Board of Directors of the Children’s Law Center, a member of the Board of Governors of the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, a Judge Pro Tem for the Los Angeles County Superior Court, a member of the Los Angeles County Bar Association Task Force on the State Criminal Justice System, and a Deputy General Counsel on the Los Angeles Police Commission’s Rampart Independent Review Panel.
A native of Philadelphia, Judge Teitelman earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics in 1969 from the University of Pennsylvania, and his law degree in 1973 from Washington University in St. Louis. Judge Teitelman worked in solo practice until 1975, when he joined Legal Services of Eastern Missouri. He served there for 23 years, including 18 as executive director and general counsel. During his tenure, the organization earned a national reputation for the wide range of programs it provides to Missourians who are unable to pay for civil legal services. His dedication to underrepresented people has earned him many honors, including the Missouri Bar President’s Award and the American Bar Association’s Make a Difference Award. In 1998, Teitelman was appointed to the Missouri Court of Appeals, where he served until his February 21, 2002 appointment to the state’s supreme court. He is the first legally blind and first Jewish judge to serve on Missouri’s highest court. He served as chair of the ABA’s Commission on Mental and Physical Disabilities Law. He was nominated to the American Bar Association's Appellate Judicial Network Steering Committee in 2007, and serves on the ABA's Standing Committee on Pro Bono and Public Service. Judge Teitelman is the American Judicature Society's liaison to the ABA House of Delegates.
Webster has been on the Florida First District Court of Appeal since 1991. He previously served as a general jurisdiction trial judge on the Florida Fourth Judicial Circuit, a lawyer in private practice with a litigation firm, and a law clerk to a federal district judge, all in Jacksonville. He has served on numerous bar and court committees and has been active in the American Inns of Court. He is also an adjunct professor at Florida Coastal School of Law. He holds a B.S.F.S. (magna cum laude) from Georgetown University, a J.D. (with distinction) from Duke University School of Law, and an LL.M. (in the judicial process) from the University of Virginia School of Law.
Ms. Wechsler is a partner at Wechsler Becker, LLP, where she handles complex family law cases, and also serves as a mediator and arbitrator. Ms. Wechsler is the immediate Past President of the Washington Chapter of the American Judicature Society. She received the received the King County Bar’s 1999 Outstanding Attorney award and the State Bar Family Law Section’s 1988 Outstanding Attorney award. Ms. Wechsler serves as Vice-Chair of the Board for Court Education and is on the Judicial College Trustees. She is a Past President of the King County Bar Association and a former President of the Washington Chapter of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers.
Andersen is a nationally-recognized authority on judicial selection, judicial independence, and improvements to the administration of justice. From 1993 to 2000, he served the American Judicature Society in several capacities, including as Director of the Center on Judicial Independence and Director of the Elmo B. Hunter Citizens Center for Judicial Selection. While at AJS, he also performed research on certification of questions of law, produced a video program on sentencing policies and practices, and implemented a national project to improve access to the courts for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.
Most recently, Andersen served as Special Assistant to the President of the American Bar Association, providing advice and counsel on a wide range of policy matters and coordinating the ABA president’s speaking engagements, meetings, and special events. He also served previously as Project Manager for the ABA Standing Committee on Judicial Independence, directing special projects to promote an independent judiciary.
Andersen has published articles on merit selection of judges, diversity in state court judiciaries, and the role of the organized bar in promoting an independent judiciary. He has directed research projects on judicial performance evaluation systems, state judicial compensation, and citizen response to jury summonses. He has testified before state legislative committees and spoken at numerous conferences on judicial selection and judicial independence issues. He holds a degree in history and American Studies from the University of Kansas.