November 2005 News

Professor Gabriel Eckstein will speak at Oregon State University’s Institute for Water and Watersheds on November 16 on “Conflict of Cooperation: North America’s Transboundary Aquifers, International Law, and a UN Treaty Initiative.” He will then speak on November 18 at the University of British Columbia’s Thompson Program in Natural Resources Law and Policy on “Conflict or Cooperation: International Law, Ground Water Resources, and the World Water Crises.”

Visiting Professor Dennis Olson will be on KRFE 580 AM from 8:30 to 9:00 a.m. on Monday, November 14, to discuss the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court. Professor Olson has previously appeared on KJTV-34 and on Fox Talk Radio 950 to discuss the nomination process.

Professor J. Wesley Cochran will be a speaker at an Information Technology Roundtable next week, "Balancing Rights & Privileges: Copyright & Intellectual Property in a Digital World." The TTU Office of the Chief Information Officer is sponsoring the roundtable. In addition, Logan Brown, a second year law student will also be a speaker. It will be held Tuesday, Nov. 15, from 3:30-5:00 p.m. in the Matador Room of the Student Union Building.

Professor Ann Graham is elected a Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation. The mission of the Texas Bar Foundation is “Building a Stronger Justice System”. The foundation has contributed more than $7 million to projects focusing on access to justice for the needy and law-related education.

Jeff Blackburn, an Amarillo attorney and Director of the Innocence Project clinic at Texas Tech Law, together with law students working in the clinic, have recently been spotlighted in the media.

The Austin Chronicle recently did a cover story on a series of cases in Jackson County, which is just south of Houston, that Blackburn and Tech law students have been investigating. The cases involve serious allegations of prosecutorial misconduct and environmental racism. Austin Chronicle article, Oct. 21, 2005

Meanwhile, the book Tulia: Race, Cocaine, and Corruption in a Small Texas Town, by Nate Blakeslee, has continued to receive favorable reviews. Blackburn was a key player in the Tulia saga and has brought his expertise in defending indigent and innocent prisoners to the Tech law school.

To find out more about or purchase the Tulia book, go to Amazon.com.

To access reviews of the book and Tulia in general, go to Washington Post article, Oct. 23, 2005; and New York Times article, Oct. 30, 2005.

Professor Ann Graham has been selected to Chair the 2006 Annual Legal Conference sponsored jointly by the Texas Savings & Community Bankers Association and the Independent Bankers Association of Texas. The Conference will be held March 30 and 31, 2006 in Horseshoe Bay, Texas. Hot topics include: Identity Theft, Home Equity Lending, Consumer Credit Reports, Banking Beyond Borders, and the Impact of Hurricane Katrina on Financial Institutions.

The Council for the International Exchange of Scholars has selected Professor Susan Saab Fortney to serve as Chair of the Balkans and Baltics Review Committee for the U.S. Fulbright Scholar Program. This peer review committee is responsible for making recommendations on applications for Fulbright Scholar research and lecture positions in a number of Balkan and Baltic countries.

Professor Vaughn James will be one of the presenters at a Law and Religion conference being held in Siquenza, Spain, November 12 to 16. The conference, which is being hosted by Universidad de Alcala de Henares, has its theme “Culture and Religious Identity in Post-Modern Society.” Speakers at the conference will come from various countries including the United States, France, Spain and Switzerland. Prof. James’s presentation will be entitled “The Role of Political Activity in the Mission of the African-American Church.” Prof. James teaches Law and Religion here at Texas Tech University School of Law.

The Virginia Tax Study Group is a small group of leading tax scholars and practitioners who meet twice a year in Charlottesville. The meetings are by invitation only. Professor Camp has been asked to be on a panel of experts to discuss the impact of the 1998 IRS Restructuring and Reform Act on IRS operations. Others on the panel include: Don Korb, the current Chief Counsel of the IRS; Mortimer Caplin, a former Commissioner of the IRS; Richard Skillman, a former Chief Counsel of the IRS; and Janet Spragens, a professor of administrative law at American University. Professor Camp will discuss the impact of IRC section 7602(c) on IRS operations. Professor Camp was a senior docket attorney at the IRS when Congress passed the 1998 legislation, led the IRS's regulatory response to several of the enacted reforms, and has published many articles critiquing the 1998 legislation.

Professor Gerry Beyer was contacted by Mike Pesca of NPR’s Day to Day program to discuss blind trusts. The story is focused around the controversy surrounding stocks that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist holds in a blind trust. Read the story....

On November 8, 2005, Professor Larry Cunningham, Director of the Texas Tech Criminal Justice Clinic, will present oral argument in the cases of State v. Ward and State v. Smith in the 7th Court of Appeals in Amarillo. Professor Cunningham is pro bono co-counsel in this case of first impression in Texas. In 2003, the Potter County DA charged his clients with "delivery of a controlled substance to a child"--the State's theory being that the "children" in question were the clients' unborn fetuses and that the "delivery" was the involuntary, in utero transmission of cocaine and meth metabolites through the umbilical cord. Cunningham will argue that this legal theory is contrary to both statutory and constitutional law and that the convictions should be overturned. Every state, except South Carolina, that has considered this novel type of prosecution has rejected it.

Associate Dean Brian Shannon has been elected to membership in the American Law Institute (ALI), the limited membership association that stands at the top of the legal profession. The ALI is the most prestigious membership a law professor can hold. Please follow this link to read more information on this story.

Robert H. Bean Professor Victoria Sutton is being honored as the 2005 Distinguished Alumna of the School of Business and Public Administration at Old Dominion University where she received her MPA. Professor Sutton is currently on leave from the Texas Tech University School of Law to a Presidential appointment. She is serving as the Chief Counsel in the Office of Research and Innovative Technology Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation. For more information on the award, please visit http://www.odualumni.org/distinguishedAlumni.htm.

Professor Bruce Kramer will be speaking at several events this fall semester. Following is a list of his speaking events:

1. Speaker and Course Director, Oil and Gas Law Short Course (week long) sponsored by Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation and Center for American and International Law - Boulder, CO - October 17-21, 2005;
2. Speaker, Annual Institute on Zoning, Planning & Eminent Domain sponsored by Center for American and International Law - Dallas, TX - November 2, 2005;
3. Speaker, Annual Institute on Zoning, Planning & Eminent Domain sponsored by Center for American and International Law - San Francisco, CA - November 16, 2005;
4. Speaker, Houston Bar Association, Oil and Gas Section - Houston, TX - November 15, 2005;
5. Speaker, Liskow & Lewis Continuing Legal Education Seminar- Houston, TX - November 10, 2005;
6. Speaker, National Oil and Gas Royalty Conference - Houston, TX  December 5, 2005.