Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio published a blog post on Intlawgrrls entitled “Torture is Always Illegal, No Matter What Results It May Produce.”  In this post, Professor Sterio responds to the recently released Senate Intelligence Committee report (“Torture Report”) on enhanced interrogation techniques used by the C.I.A. post 9/11.  Professor Sterio argues that these techniques amounted to torture under both international law (the Convention Against Torture, and various courts’ interpretations of this Convention) as well as domestic law.  In addition, Professor Sterio argues in this post that the question of whether enhanced interrogation techniques produced valuable intelligence results is irrelevant, because even if such techniques did produce excellent intelligence information (which the Senate committee report proves they did not), such techniques are still illegal because they amount to torture, and should never be utilized.

C|M|LAW Assistant Professor Joseph Mead undertook pro bono representation of a former public school teacher who was removed from his position because a dairy farmer from the community complained about the school teacher’s vegan advocacy on Facebook.  In a letter to the school district, Professor Mead explained that the district’s action violates the guarantee to freedom of speech contained in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.  The letter demanded that the teacher be immediately reinstated, arguing that “Urging people to drink soy milk on Facebook is not a fireable offense” and “forcing those who teach future citizens to relinquish their citizenship rights has no support in law or policy.”   Professor Mead, who holds a joint appointment with the Maxine Goodman Levin College of Urban Affairs, previously litigated constitutional cases for the United States Department of Justice, and is handling this case in cooperation with the ACLU of Ohio.

A copy of the letter can be accessed here.  Professor Mead was recently interviewed about this case; the interview and a  news story about the case are available here.  Several other local and  Chicago-based news and media outlets have picked up this story (available here, here and here).

Heidi Gorovitz Robertson, C|M|LAW’s Steven W. Percy Distinguished Professor of Law, presented Current Issues in Shale Gas Development at the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association’s 2014 Environmental Law Symposium on Wednesday, December 10, 2014. Robertson spoke about property rights, jurisdictional issues and local regulatory concerns regarding Ohio’s governance structure for shale oil and gas development.

On December 4, 2014, Professor Robertson was an invited participant at Let Fifty Flowers Bloom, a participatory symposium at Case Western Reserve Law School to provide comments and discussion on Professor Jonathan Adler’s draft book of the same name.

On December 4th, Professor Ken Kowalski presented at the National Labor Relations Board Region 8 Labor Law seminar at the Ritz Carlton in downtown Cleveland.

His presentation was entitled “Recent Supreme Court Decisions, Appellate Decisions and Related Topics in Labor and Employment Law.”

Clinical Professor of Law Doron Kalir gave two lectures on Israel at Case Western Reserve’s Siegal Lifelong Learning Program. The first lecture – “Israel: Still ‘Jewish & Democratic’?” – explored the historical, political, and legal circumstances that contributed to Israel’s definition as both Jewish and Democratic in its Basic Laws, and wondered whether such definition is still sustainable. The second, “What’s New(s) in Israel” reported on current political developments in Israel in light of the continued Gaza conflict, the growing economic disparity, and recent Supreme Court rulings regarding African asylum seekers. 

Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio will contribute the lead article for Suffolk University Law School Transnational Law Review’s summer 2015 symposium issue on refugees in the Middle East, and stability and instability amongst Middle Eastern countries.  Professor Sterio’s article will focus on humanitarian intervention in Syria and/or Iraq against the Islamic State (ISIS).  The article will be entitled: “Humanitarian Intervention Against ISIS.”

Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio participated in a panel discussion entitled “The Happy Dog Takes on the World: Gang Violence in Central America and the Causes of the Immigration Wave” on December 2.  The program was sponsored by the City Club of Cleveland, as well as the Cleveland Council on World Affairs.  The other participants included co-panelist Brian Stefan-Szittai from the Inter-Religious Task Force, and moderator Tony Ganzer from WCPN.

Professor Karin Mika has been appointed a peer editor for the ABA’s International Year in Review, an annual publication by the ABA reviewing developments in international law.  This year, Professor Mika will be editing the section on developments in African law.

Professor and Associate Dean Milena Sterio contributed two articles on the legal issues related to the United States’ use of drones to conduct targeted killings overseas.  The first article, “The Covert Use of Drones: How Secrecy Undermines Oversight and Accountability,” will be published in a special “drones” issue of the Albany Government Law Review (Albany Law School).  The second article, “Drones: A Proposal for Better Policy Guidelines,” will be published in the Wake Forest Journal of Law and Policy, also in a special issues on drones.

Professor Steve Lazarus spoke on Friday November 14, at the Supreme Court of Ohio Commission on Professionalism’s 3rd Annual Student-to-Lawyer Symposium titled “Preparing the Leaders of Tomorrow’s Changing Legal Profession” in Columbus, Ohio.  The Symposium was attended by lawyers, judges, students and professors from all over the state (and northern Kentucky).  Professor Lazarus spoke on the topic of “What is the ‘New Normal'” in the profession and specifically in the law schools.  For a more detailed report about this event, click here.