Faculty Activities 2020

Faculty, Alumni Explore Race and the Law in Renewed Lecture Series

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Jan 2021 23:55:05 +0000

Faculty, Alumni Explore Race and the Law in Renewed Lecture Series Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 01/04/2021 - 16:55

Julia Roth

Following a successful launch in 2020, the University of Colorado Law School’s Race and the Law lecture series will continue in 2021 with an impressive lineup of faculty and alumni speakers.

Professors Kristen Carpenter, Ann England, Alexia Brunet Marks, and Ahmed White; director of the Korey Wise Innocence Project Anne-Marie Moyes; postdoctoral fellow Hunter Knapp ('20); and civil rights and criminal defense attorney Tyrone Glover ('09) are slated to speak on the ways in which racism manifests itself in various areas of the law.

This year’s lineup expands the series' impact through partnerships with diversity bar associations, student groups, and alumni experts.

"As we seek to confront racism and its manifestations around us, the Race and the Law lecture series provides a much-needed opportunity to hear from thought leaders in our community who are committed to dismantling the persistent manifestations of inequality, and to reflect on what each of us can do to address the issues presented," said Dean S. James Anaya. "I look forward to more thought-provoking conversations in 2021."

The Race and the Law lecture series began in September 2020 as part of Anaya's Anti-Racism and Representation Initiative. Announced in July, the year-long initiative includes a broad range of actions and programs to confront racism and advance greater inclusion in legal education and the legal profession.

Approximately 500 individuals attended Race and the Law sessions in 2020. Topics including race and the Constitution, how race and the idea of equality have played out in federal law; the criminal legal system’s disproportionate adverse effect on the privacy interests of people of color and impoverished communities; and how the city of Denver has addressed the special challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic for people of color. Past sessions are available to watch here.

See below for more information and to register for upcoming Race and the Law sessions.

Each session will take place from 5 until 6:15 p.m. MT.

February 18

Race and Religion: A Case Study on Indigenous Peoples in the United States

Presented by Kristen Carpenter, Council Tree Professor of Law

February 23

Criminalizing Race: A Practitioner’s Perspective on Policing and Mass Incarceration

Presented by Tyrone Glover ('09), civil rights and criminal defense attorney, Killmer, Lane & Newman, LLP

March 11

Racial Implications of Injustices in Food and Agriculture

Presented by Alexia Brunet Marks, associate professor of law, and Hunter Knapp (’20), postdoctoral research fellow

April 29

When Black Lives Don't Matter: Years Lost to Wrongful Convictions in the Black Community

Presented by Anne-Marie Moyes, director, Korey Wise Innocence Project at Colorado Law, and Ann England, clinical professor of law

May 6

The Diversification of Inequality: The Question of Class and the Politics of Inclusion

Presented by Ahmed White, Nicholas Rosenbaum Professor of Law

Following a successful launch in 2020, the University of Colorado Law School’s Race and the Law lecture series will continue in 2021 with an impressive lineup of faculty and alumni speakers.

Off

Traditional

White

Professor Suzette Malveaux Delivers 2020 Austin W. Scott Jr. Lecture

Anonymous — Thu, 03 Dec 2020 16:59:00 +0000

Professor Suzette Malveaux Delivers 2020 Austin W. Scott Jr. Lecture Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 12/03/2020 - 09:59

Suzette Malveaux, Provost Professor of

Civil Rights Law at the University of Colorado Law School, delivered the 46th annual Austin W. Scott Jr. Lecture virtually on Tuesday, Dec. 1, at 5:30 p.m. MST. The lecture was titled "Is It Time for a New Civil Rights Act? Addressing Modern Obstructionist Procedure." The Scott Lecture is presented annually by a member of the faculty engaged in a significant scholarly project who is selected by the dean.

Watch the Recording

In this lecture, Malveaux explored how the U.S. Supreme Court’s civil procedure jurisprudence has undermined access to justice and civil rights enforcement, and why a new civil rights law is necessary during this critical and tumultuous time in our country. Borrowing from the sweeping Civil Rights Act of 1991 and the historic Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, Malveaux examined the catalysts that led to these restorative statutes and make the argument for a similarly groundbreaking one today. Malveaux’s research and writing in this area is the culmination of a legal career dedicated to the pursuit of social justice and making the civil litigation system more equitable.

The United States is in the midst of the largest civil rights movement since that of the 1960s, and calls for justice for Black and marginalized communities are stronger than ever. Many decry the violence such communities have experienced as a result of centuries of systemic racism and discrimination, which has led to significant, though insufficient, legislative gains. What has received comparatively scant attention, however, is the violence done to those legislative gains, and to civil rights more generally, through the Supreme Court’s increasingly obstructionist procedural jurisprudence.

Over the last quarter-century, the Supreme Court has been slowly chipping away at the process by which everyday people have gained access to the civil court system to resolve their grievances and seek remedies. Meaningful access to the civil litigation system is a right each citizen has by virtue of the Constitution. Yet, in this obstructionist climate, that access has been commodified, compromised, and politicized. The Court has, in small but powerful ways, systemically eroded Americans’ capacity to enforce their substantive rights. This regressive trend has become even more acute under the Roberts Court, and for constitutional and statutory civil rights. Over the course of several decades, the pendulum has swung from robust enforcement of civil rights to tolerance, if not outright hostility, to such claims. Less obvious, but no less harmful, has been the way procedure has undermined, and sometimes even eradicated, civil litigation aimed at protecting these rights. The Court’s obstructionism, however, has been neither absolute nor uniform, thereby making it hard to address. It is death by a thousand cuts; the insidious power of incrementalism.

Malveaux examined whether meaningful access to and use of the civil court system has retracted to the point of requiring legislative resuscitation. Having answered this normative question in the affirmative, she explained why Congress is most suited vis-à-vis other institutions to make this course correction. Malveaux addressed whether this is the right time for corrective civil rights legislation, analogizing to historical examples such as the sweeping Civil Rights Act of 1991, and more targeted historic Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. Finally, she offered prescriptive measures, setting forth broadly what a procedural civil rights restoration act would comprise, particularly in the areas of pleadings, class actions, and arbitration. Malveaux concluded that such restorative legislation would realign process-law-drafters’ intentions, institutional competencies, and the core values of democracy with the public dispute resolution system.

the Scott Lecture

The Austin W. Scott Jr. lecture is named after Austin Scott, a member of the law school faculty for 20 years. He was a beloved teacher as well as a prolific writer, whose scholarly work was in the fields of criminal law and procedure. In 1973, former Colorado Law Dean Don W. Sears established the lecture series in his memory. Each year, the dean of the law school selects a member of the faculty engaged in a significant scholarly project to lecture on his or her research. Learn more about the Austin W. Scott Jr. Lecture.

Suzette Malveaux

Suzette Malveaux is Provost Professor of Civil Rights Law at the University of Colorado Law School. She also serves as director of the law school’s Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law. She teaches Civil Procedure, Employment Discrimination, and Constitutional Law Problems. Malveaux has published numerous law review articles that explore the intersection of civil procedure and civil rights and coauthored Class Actions and Other Multi-Party Litigation; Cases and Materials (West, 2006, 2012). She has presented at dozens of conferences in this area.

Malveaux started her teaching career at the University of Alabama School of Law in 2003 and joined the Columbus School of Law in 2006. She has taught as a visiting professor at the University of Iowa College of Law and Washington and Lee University School of Law. Prior to academia, she was a class action litigation specialist who second chaired oral argument before the U.S. Supreme Court and argued before the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. For example, she represented over 1.5 million women in Wal-Mart v. Dukes, the largest employment discrimination class action in U.S. history to date. She practiced law in Washington, D.C., at Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld & Toll, P.L.L.C. and the Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights & Urban Affairs.

If you have any questions about this event, please contact lawevents@colorado.edu or (303) 492-8048.

In this lecture, titled "Is It Time for a New Civil Rights Act? Addressing Modern Obstructionist Procedure," Professor Suzette Malveaux explored how the U.S. Supreme Court’s civil procedure jurisprudence has undermined access to justice and civil rights enforcement, and why a new civil rights law is necessary during this critical and tumultuous time in our country. Watch a recording.

Off

Traditional

White

How to Do Things With Legal Doctrine: A Conversation With Pierre Schlag and Amy J. Griffin

Anonymous — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 21:40:48 +0000

How to Do Things With Legal Doctrine: A Conversation With Pierre Schlag and Amy J. Griffin Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 10/26/2020 - 15:40

In law, doctrine is the coin of the realm. Yet judges, lawyers, and law students often take the very idea of doctrine for granted, without asking how doctrine works—what it means, does, or might be made to do. Professors Pierre Schlag and Amy J. Griffin seek to change that with their new book, How to Do Things With Legal Doctrine (University of Chicago Press, 2020).

How can there be anything left to say about legal reasoning?

Pierre Schlag (PS): I actually think there is a huge amount left to say about legal reasoning. Now, if by legal reasoning we mean simply deduction, induction, reasoning by analogy, and the like, then there is not a whole lot left to say. But if one thinks about legal reasoning more broadly—by including all those moves that lawyers and judges use in constructing reasoned arguments for their positions, then there is a terrific amount to say. Legal reasoning as I see it includes setting the scene, framing the issues, anchoring the assumptions, surveying the possibilities, comparing the solutions, and so on. Very little in legal argument is settled because someone makes a sterling inductive argument or exposes a faulty deduction. It can happen, but it is rare. Instead, the success or failure of legal argument turns much more on the topics we cover in our book: how to create and undo legal distinctions, how to create or resolve baseline issues, how to bring out or shut down interpretive difficulties.

Now, the problem has been that because these things are often fluid, jurists and legal scholars have often thought that there’s not much to say about them. Our book demonstrates that this is not so. There are patterns to the chaos, logic to the ambiguities. We try to make the patterns explicit.

What were you after in this book? Who do you hope to reach and about what?

Amy J. Griffin (AG): I have long been frustrated by what seems to me to be a push to simplify legal reasoning—to make it fit into a one-size-fits-all formula. As a result of what has been likely a well-meaning effort to make legal analysis less daunting for students, I fear that law school has also made it much less interesting.

We are hoping that this book will reach a significant number of law professors and help them teach the more creative aspects of legal reasoning. The idea of law as "a creative enterprise," as we describe it in the book, might then, in turn, reach a significant number of law students. As someone who has taught legal writing for 15 years, I know we can do better on this front.

What made you seek out a collaborator for this project?

PS: Well, I didn’t want just any collaborator. I asked Amy because she is deeply interested in teaching and especially legal reasoning, and really close to the students in terms of understanding their struggles. Also, a nontraditional book like this one really required someone who could think outside the box while also being very grounded in what judges, lawyers, and students need, practically speaking. And this book posed a real challenge: People don’t think much about “legal doctrine.” There’s a reason for that—David Foster Wallace’s story about the fish pretty much sums it up:

There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, "Morning, boys. How’s the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, "What the hell is water?"

Well, what the hell is doctrine?

We were trying to answer that question. But more than that, we were trying to focus on those tough moments when legal doctrine runs out and yet still the issues won’t go away. The brief still has to be written, the judicial opinion finished. So what do you do then? That’s a very large part of what our book addresses. It’s a legal reasoning book to read after you’ve already mastered the basics.

You mentioned above that law students are a crucial audience. What about lawyers and judges? What can the book contribute to their work or their thought?

AG: Hopefully, lawyers and judges will find it to be one of the more practical theoretical books they’ve ever read. As we say in the book, we’d like it to be used as an argument resource, a spur, and a guide to brainstorming. One of the things we’ve tried to do is make the invisible visible—to help lawyers and judges see patterns across fields of law that they might not have otherwise noticed. Once you’ve thought about baselines in law, you see them everywhere. Once you see the patterns you can’t unsee them. Recognizing doctrine as form is like the fish seeing the water in Wallace’s parable—it provides an entirely new perspective.

We have a book of exercises available on the University of Chicago Press website in which we ask how the various moves in our book can be used to make arguments in real cases: When is a fish not a "tangible object"? Is one 38-year-old horse enough to turn an interest in land into a “farm tenancy”? (Once you start reading cases you realize there’s no need to make anything up.) Not only do these examples help students understand the concepts we’re explaining, but they also demonstrate rather convincingly that the moves we describe really do come into play—indeed, have to come into play. That’s what legal practice is about.

Pierre Schlag is University Distinguished Professor and Byron R. White Professor of Law. Amy J. Griffin is associate dean for instructional development, legal writing professor, and director of legal writing support.

Off

Traditional

White

Talking Criminal Justice With Benjamin Levin

Anonymous — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 21:27:36 +0000

Talking Criminal Justice With Benjamin Levin Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 10/26/2020 - 15:27

Associate Professor Benjamin Levin studies criminal law and policy. Here he discusses the relationship between the coronavirus pandemic and criminal justice reform, police unions and their role in policymaking, and mass incarceration in the United States. His latest articles, “What’s Wrong with Police Unions?" and "Imagining the Progressive Prosecutor," are forthcoming in the Columbia Law Review and Minnesota Law Review, respectively.

Why is it necessary to consider criminal justice reform in the context of other movements for social and economic change?

The criminal system doesn’t operate in a vacuum. Too often, discussions of criminal law focus on individual cases or questions of morality as though they aren’t tied to institutional design decisions relating to housing, employment, mental health, and a host of social services. One reason we have so many criminal laws on the books and so many people incarcerated is a failure to think outside of the box of punishment and explore nonpunitive responses to social problems. So, a fuller picture of criminal justice reform would consider the way that criminal law interacts with other regulatory schemes and the way that criminal punishment implicates noncriminal institutions.

What sparked your interest in police unions and their role in policymaking?

After law school, I worked at a firm representing victims of police misconduct. In our cases, police unions operated as stand-ins for "bad policing," serving as obstacles to reform and accountability. That view of police unions has predominated in the academic literature and in policy conversations I’ve been a part of. At the same time, I come from a pro-labor background, and I have written about historical hostility toward unions. So, I arrive at my study of police unions from a place of ambivalence: I worry about the role they have played in upholding the injustices of our criminal system. But I also worry about the ways in which criticism of them can cut more broadly and support attacks on organized labor.

What has the death of George Floyd and others at the hands of the police revealed about the state of police unions, and what reform is necessary?

I see them as revealing more about policing than police unions. The video of Officer Derek Chauvin killing George Floyd drives home the violence inherent in policing and the ways that violence implicates inequality along lines of race, class, and social marginalization. Unions become an easy target for outrage because they have taken a hard line in support of officers accused of misconduct. It’s important to recognize the role of unions in setting policy. (I’m actually a part of a nationwide working group on state labor law and policing.) But the focus on unions risks letting others off the hook. Elected officials have failed to rein in police and have signed off on contracts that stymie oversight. Lawmakers, judges, and voters have continued to expand the criminal system and empower police. Putting the blame on unions obscures that complicity and, I worry, plays into a broader narrative about public-sector unions (rather than policing) as the real problem.

How has the coronavirus pandemic exposed structural flaws of the U.S. criminal system during "normal" times?

Over 2 million people are locked up, and millions more are under some form of state supervision. For those who are directly affected by the system, the brutality of its "normal" operations is unavoidable. The pandemic has shone a light on and exacerbated many aspects of the system that often escape the broader public’s attention. For example, people charged with crimes are often held in jail awaiting trial because they can’t afford bail. Despite being presumptively innocent, they can be locked up for days, weeks, or months. That dynamic has led to constitutional challenges and legislative efforts in Colorado and elsewhere to enact "bail reform." During the pandemic, the injustices of incarcerating people because they are too poor to pay has become even clearer: Jails are petri dishes for disease, so leaving someone locked up could mean death or serious illness.

What opportunities and challenges does the coronavirus present for criminal justice reform?

The pandemic has thrown many societal flaws into stark relief. Economic inequality appears even more glaring as some of us are able to work from home, while others lose jobs and housing. Similarly, the criminal system’s harshness has become clearer to many people who otherwise wouldn’t be aware. The pandemic helps bring urgency to discussions about reform: Jails and prisons are the sources of many of the nation’s largest clusters of cases, so addressing mass incarceration has become a pressing public health concern. The worry, though, is that folks might view the problems identified this summer as "exceptional" and see emergency fixes as long-term solutions, rather than stopgap measures to address longstanding injustice.

What advice do you have for law students interested in a career in criminal justice reform?

Don’t get discouraged! I am thrilled by how many CU grads go into criminal practice, and it’s an exciting moment to be working in the field because there is so much interest in reform. But that doesn’t mean there are easy answers. The policy questions are hard, and the politics are complicated. Mass incarceration didn’t happen overnight, and neither will a transformation of the system.

Associate Professor Benjamin Levin discusses the relationship between the coronavirus pandemic and criminal justice reform, police unions and their role in policymaking, and mass incarceration in the United States.

Off

Traditional

White

Scott Skinner-Thompson Publishes Book: Privacy at the Margins

Anonymous — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 20:14:29 +0000

Scott Skinner-Thompson Publishes Book: Privacy at the Margins Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 10/26/2020 - 14:14

In a new book, Privacy at the Margins, Associate Professor Scott Skinner-Thompson explores how limited legal protections for privacy lead directly to concrete, material harms for many marginalized communities, including discrimination, harassment, and violence.

Skinner-Thompson’s interest in constitutional privacy rights originated in a project with the American Civil Liberties Union, where he researched whether state constitutional privacy law provided a means to challenge laws limiting peoples’ ability to change their gender markers on government identification documents, thereby “outing” transgender people who could not obtain accurate IDs. He began to notice and examine the multiple ways diminished privacy rights impacted many intersectional, marginalized groups.

"What I found is that privacy violations are used to push minority groups from the public square, thereby stymieing their ability to influence and shape democratic governance,” he said.

The book, published by Cambridge University Press this fall, explains how privacy can further equality goals by serving as a form of expressive resistance to government and corporate surveillance, and demonstrates why efforts undertaken by vulnerable groups to protect their privacy should be entitled to constitutional protection under the First Amendment and related equality provisions.

"The government continues to take advantage of weak legal privacy rights to surveil marginalized individuals, and, as I argue, privacy can begin to gain greater legal protection once we understand that those who try to protect their privacy are engaging in expressive statements of resistance to surveillance regimes, entitling their privacy efforts to protection under the First Amendment," he said. “Recent diverse protests around the globe where people have worn masks (for health protection but also privacy) highlight the expressive power of privacy as a tool of resistance."

By examining the ways even limited privacy can enrich and enhance lives at the margins in material ways, the book demonstrates how privacy can be transformed from a liberal affectation to a legal tool of liberation from oppression.

"My hope is that readers begin to see privacy not merely as some luxury right that can be surrendered or traded away, but that it is a key bulwark against a host of other harms," he said.

Skinner-Thompson, who joined the faculty in 2017, focuses his research and teaching in the areas of constitutional law, civil rights, and privacy law, with a particular focus on LGBTQ and HIV issues.

Privacy at the Margins was a co-recipient of Colorado Law's 2020 Gamm Justice Award, given annually by the law school for outstanding scholarship addressing critical issues in justice.

In a new book, Associate Professor Scott Skinner-Thompson explores how limited legal protections for privacy lead directly to concrete, material harms for many marginalized communities, including discrimination, harassment, and violence.

Off

Traditional

White

Clinical Professor Carla Fredericks Named Executive Director of Global Foundation

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Oct 2020 18:38:35 +0000

Clinical Professor Carla Fredericks Named Executive Director of Global Foundation Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 10/20/2020 - 12:38

University of Colorado Law School Clinical Professor Carla Fredericks has been named the next executive director of The Christensen Fund, a grantmaking foundation that supports Indigenous peoples and local communities in their efforts to advance biocultural diversity, effective January 1, 2021.

An enrolled citizen of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation of North Dakota, Fredericks will be the first Native American to lead The Christensen Fund, and the first Native person to lead a private foundation of its size.

"I am grateful and humbled by the bold and exciting commitment The Christensen Fund has made to support implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples," Fredericks said. "This remarkable mission serves both to defend and elevate Indigenous peoples and ensure protection for all beings on this planet. I appreciate this opportunity to share a vision to implement this strategic philanthropic endeavor, and I am eager to begin work with the incredible team at such a critical moment in society and for the growth of The Christensen Fund."

Fredericks has served as director of Colorado Law's American Indian Law Clinic since 2013. She also served as director of the American Indian Law Program from 2013 until 2018.

During her time at CU, Fredericks lent her expertise in Indigenous peoples law, federal Indian law, human rights, development, finance, and business and human rights to several cross-campus initiatives. In 2017, she founded First Peoples Worldwide, an interdisciplinary program housed at CU’s Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies, for which Fredericks serves as a founding executive board member.

As First Peoples Worldwide’s founding director, she led collaborations between Indigenous peoples and investors to address the unique social and environmental impacts of corporate development in Indigenous communities, while preparing students to address the pressing social responsibility challenges facing today’s businesses. In 2018, she coauthored a case study examining the numerous social costs and material losses attendant to the Dakota Access Pipeline project to highlight the costs faced by failing to account for the human rights of indigenous peoples.

She also serves as an affiliate faculty for the Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility.

Fredericks is a 2001 graduate of Columbia Law School, where she was executive editor of the Columbia Journal of Environmental Law. She earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado.

Prior to joining Colorado Law, Fredericks was a partner at Milberg LLP in New York, where she founded the firm’s Native American practice and directed its civil/human rights litigation.

She maintains an active pro bono practice focused on complex and appellate litigation and Native American affairs, representing Indian tribes and organizations in a variety of litigation and policy matters. She is chair of the Board of Trustees for the Mashantucket Pequot (Western) Endowment Trust.

University of Colorado Law School Clinical Professor Carla Fredericks has been named the next executive director of The Christensen Fund, a grantmaking foundation that supports Indigenous peoples and local communities in their efforts to advance biocultural diversity, effective January 1, 2021.

Off

Traditional

White

Pizzi's New Book Highlights Supreme Court's Role in Mass Incarceration

Anonymous — Thu, 08 Oct 2020 19:52:40 +0000

Pizzi's New Book Highlights Supreme Court's Role in Mass Incarceration Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 10/08/2020 - 13:52

Since the late 1960s, crime rates in the United States have fallen at the same time that incarceration rates have climbed. In his new book, The Supreme Court’s Role in Mass Incarceration, University of Colorado Law School Professor Emeritus Bill Pizzi illuminates the role of the U.S. Supreme Court's "criminal procedure revolution" as a contributing factor to this rise in U.S. incarceration rates.

Professor Emeritus Bill Pizzi

The book, published Sept. 18 by Routledge, contends that the Supreme Court has been overlooked as a powerful force in the rise of incarceration rates, starting with the long line of decisions handed down in the Warren Court era (1953-1969) that made the criminal justice system so complicated and expensive that it no longer serves to protect defendants. For example, Pizzi points to Anders v. California, which effectively mandates full appellate review after all criminal trials, and Baldwin v. New York, which extended the right to jury trials to misdemeanor cases.

"Our criminal justice system is badly broken. We can put some of the blame on police and law enforcement policies, we can blame politicians who enact harsh laws—like the war on drugs—and we can put some blame on aggressive prosecutors,” Pizzi said. "But we will never lower our incarceration rate by even half until we understand that not all pieces of the criminal procedure revolution worked well."

Pizzi argues that part of the explanation for the increase in mass incarceration is the Court's failure to understand that a trial system with robust rights for defendants is not a strong trial system unless it is also reliable and efficient.

For the vast majority of defendants, their constitutional rights are irrelevant, as they are forced to accept plea bargains or face the prospect of a comparatively harsh sentence if convicted. The prospect of a trial, once an important restraint on prosecutors in charging, has disappeared and plea bargaining rules, he said.

Pizzi contrasts the trial and pretrial systems of other common law countries, such as Canada and England, from those of the U.S., and demonstrates how those systems help keep incarceration rates much lower. The incentives in those countries are to keep charges low if possible, while the incentives in the U.S. are to charge as much as possible, Pizzi explained.

"In the case of Canada, whose crime rates are similar to those of the U.S., their incarceration rate has been stable for decades, while ours quintupled starting in the late 1970s,” he said.

The publisher describes the book as essential reading for both graduate and undergraduate students in corrections and criminal justice courses as well as judges, attorneys, and others working in the criminal justice system.

Pizzi, who joined the Colorado Law faculty in 1975 and took emeritus status in 2010, is one of the foremost scholars in the U.S. on comparative criminal issues. He is the author of Trials without Truth: Why Our System of Criminal Trials Has Become an Expensive Failure and What We Need to Do to Rebuild It (NYU Press 1999) and has written more than 60 scholarly articles on criminal law, criminal procedure, and comparative law. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School and holds an advanced degree in philosophy from the University of Massachusetts. Following law school, Pizzi was a federal prosecutor in the District of New Jersey before joining the faculty at Colorado Law.

University of Colorado Law School Professor Emeritus Bill Pizzi has released a new book that illuminates the role of the U.S. Supreme Court in the rise in U.S. incarceration rates.

Off

Traditional

White

Recent Graduate, Professors Examine Impact of COVID-19 on Vulnerable Communities

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Sep 2020 18:14:04 +0000

Recent Graduate, Professors Examine Impact of COVID-19 on Vulnerable Communities Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 09/11/2020 - 12:14

Hunter Knapp ('20)

A new report coauthored by postdoctoral fellow and recent graduate Hunter Knapp ('20) and University of Colorado Law School Associate Professor Alexia Brunet Marks seeks to protect Colorado food workers in their workplaces as they contribute their essential labor throughout the state’s food system.

COVID-19 has exposed the particular vulnerabilities of these essential food system workers, who include farmworkers, processing workers, warehouse and distribution workers, retail and food service workers, and last-mile delivery workers.

Recommendations offered in the Colorado COVID-Responsive Essential Food System Worker Policy Agenda, presented to Gov. Jared Polis in August, include providing paid sick leave, family leave, and personal protective equipment to essential food system workers; addressing workplace conditions; and closing gaps in state and federal laws and funding. Brunet Marks, who serves on the Colorado Coronavirus Farm and Food Systems Task Force, and Knapp worked with Project Protect Food Systems to write the report, which was published in the University of Colorado Law Review Online Forum.

“Food system workers have been undervalued, at best, and often exploited," the report states. "The cruel irony of this disregard was thrown into sharp relief when, as part of the pandemic response, workers throughout the food system were deemed 'essential.' The 'Essential Worker' designation turns an inconvenient truth into an undeniable one: all people—and all Coloradans—rely upon food system workers to meet their basic needs in times of calm and crisis. Now that our collective dependence on FSWs has been laid bare, it is time to offer them dignity, respect, and support in tangible forms."

Associate Professor Alexia Brunet Marks

Knapp hopes that people who read the report see concrete steps that the government can take to protect workers in the workplace, as well as workers and their families outside the workplace.

“That two-pronged approach can ensure that communities are able to stay safe and healthy while food system workers continue to provide their essential labor for the people of Colorado," he said. "Some priorities, like requiring businesses to post all COVID-19 related information in languages accessible to employees, demand immediate action, while others, such as empowering community-based healthcare systems, can create benefits for Colorado long after we persevere the COVID-19 crisis."

"Hunter is an asset to Project Protect Food Systems and his contribution to the paper—and to the task force—has been invaluable. He is a problem-solver who works tirelessly for the rights of those living at the margins,” Brunet Marks said.

The report is one of several community-facing projects Knapp has undertaken as a postdoctoral fellow. He has worked with other Colorado Law faculty members on projects related to COVID-19’s impact on immigrants and racial minority groups. This summer, he filed an agency comment with Associate Professor Ming Hsu Chen and Clinical Professor Violeta Chapin on the eligibility of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients for Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding. This fall, he will work with Chen to research the impacts of COVID-19 on census undercounting, voting rights, and discrimination in Latinx and Asian communities, in addition to other projects related to the Immigration and Citizenship Law program.

"Hunter’s breadth of knowledge and depth of experience enables him to make a real impact on research and advocacy for immigrants," Chen said.

Knapp entered law school following a career in biology, and quickly realized his passion for immigration law and eliminating institutional racism. He learned from mentors such as Chen, for whom he served as a research assistant; Chapin, who teaches the Criminal/Immigration Defense Clinic; and Legal Writing Professor Megan Hall (’05), who teaches Refugee and Asylum Law.

" a month into my first year of law school, President Trump and Jeff Sessions attempted to rescind DACA,” Knapp said. "That day, I reached out to Professor Megan Hall (my legal writing professor and former Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network attorney) to ask for her help understanding it all. At her office hours that week, she patiently walked me through the basics of immigration law and answered my questions about DACA, Trump's proposed wall, and everything else. I asked her what I could do to help as a first-year law student, and Professor Hall introduced me to another person who would become a mentor, Professor Violeta Chapin.”

Knapp will continue his work with essential food system workers this fall with a donation drive to increase access to education technology for families of food system workers and the development of a Farmworker Bill of Rights to ensure access to essential labor rights, such as a minimum wage and overtime pay.

He hopes to use his legal career to continue assisting immigrants, Colorado farmworkers, and other vulnerable members of society.

"Although 2020 has been a year of unprecedented turmoil, we need to endure this pandemic and prepare to meet future challenges by remaking our Emergency Management systems to be more equitable and inclusive," Knapp said.

Learn More:

Professor Alexia Brunet Marks delivers a Colorado Law Talk on The Roles and Rights of Essential Food System Workers During COVID-19, combining stories of essential food workers with necessary reforms driven by her work on the Colorado COVID Food Systems Rapid Response Team.

A new report coauthored by postdoctoral fellow and recent graduate Hunter Knapp ('20) and University of Colorado Law School Associate Professor Alexia Brunet Marks seeks to protect Colorado food workers in their workplaces as they contribute their essential labor throughout the state’s food system.

Off

Traditional

White

Professor Deborah Cantrell Recognized for Clinic's Work Advocating for Mobile Homeowners Across Colorado

Anonymous — Mon, 24 Aug 2020 16:57:26 +0000

Professor Deborah Cantrell Recognized for Clinic's Work Advocating for Mobile Homeowners Across Colorado Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/24/2020 - 10:57

University of Colorado Law School Professor and Director of Clinical Programs Deborah Cantrell is a recipient of ��«��Ƶ County Public Health’s 2020 Healthy Community Award. The award recognizes her supervision of Colorado Law's Sustainable Community Development Clinic, which played a leading role in developing recently passed legislation that supports mobile homeowners in Colorado.

In June, Gov. Jared Polis signed Mobile Home Park Residents Opportunity to Purchase (HB20-1201) and Mobile Home Park Act Updates (HB20-1196) into law, which provide critical support for mobile homeowners across the state.

The team of student attorneys in the Sustainable Community Development Clinic crafted the legislation on behalf of a coalition that included mobile homeowners, public health offices, and housing and anti-poverty advocates. The team drafted new statutory provisions that provide mobile homeowners protections related to utilities billing, created new anti-retaliation measures, and put in place restrictions on the kinds of rules and regulations that a park owner can require of mobile homeowners.

"I am incredibly proud of the sustained, detailed, and creative work of student attorneys McKenzie Brandon ('21), Diana Jenkins ('21), James Kadolph ('21), and Cam Netherland ('20)," Cantrell said. "They kept up their work full steam even when the pandemic closed down the state capitol. They exemplify Colorado Law’s commitment to change for our communities."

The student attorneys also drafted legislation to create a mandatory framework that provides mobile homeowners with a path to purchasing their mobile home park if a park owner decides to sell or transfer ownership of the park. Colorado joins only 18 states with such legislation.

Mobile home communities are one of the most important sources of affordable housing in the state, Cantrell explained. They are particularly critical sources of housing for people who do not qualify for subsidized housing because of the range of restrictions placed on housing subsidies, such as citizenship status.

The Sustainable Community Development Clinic is Colorado Law's newest legal clinic, formed in fall 2016. The clinic considers the role of sustainable development as reflecting commitments to social justice and to reducing poverty. Colorado Law offers nine legal clinics, all of which address critical community needs. In these courses, second- and third-year law students provide free legal services to clients on actual cases, which range from legal matters related to youth and families (Juvenile and Family Law Clinic) to the preservation of tribal sovereignty and Native lands (American Indian Law Clinic) to providing pro bono transactional legal services for entrepreneurs and small businesses (Entrepreneurial Law Clinic).

University of Colorado Law School Professor and Director of Clinical Programs Deborah Cantrell is a recipient of ��«��Ƶ County Public Health’s 2020 Healthy Community Award for her work supporting mobile homeowners in Colorado.

Off

Traditional

White

In New Book, Professor Ming Hsu Chen Examines Citizenship in the Enforcement Era

Anonymous — Thu, 13 Aug 2020 23:08:32 +0000

In New Book, Professor Ming Hsu Chen Examines Citizenship in the Enforcement Era Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 08/13/2020 - 17:08

In Pursuing Citizenship in the Enforcement Era, University of Colorado Law School Associate Professor Ming Hsu Chen shares the everyday perspectives of immigrants on what it is like to try to integrate into American society during a time when immigration policy is focused on enforcement and exclusion.

Off

Traditional

White