On June 13, 2019, Professor John Plecnik spoke at the Celebration of the 28th Anniversary of the Independence of the Republic of Slovenia in Cleveland City Hall.  Professor Plecnik, who also serves as Vice President of Council and Councilman-at-Large for the City of Willoughby Hills, spoke alongside Mayor Frank Jackson, Councilman Mike Polensek and fmr. Councilman Joe Cimperman of Cleveland, State Senator and Democratic Minority Leader Kenny Yuko, Slovenian Consul General Andrej Rode, and Slovenian Ambassador to the United States Stanislov Vidovič.  In his remarks, Professor Plecnik recalled his conversation with Mayor, Governor and Senator George Voinovich three years ago at the 25th Anniversary of Slovenian Independence, and spoke of how all Slovenians are family.

Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson and Professor Plecnik

Professor Heidi Gorovitz Robertson participated in the John W. Adams Summer Scholars Program in Socio-Legal Studies at Kenyon College on June 7, 2019.  The theme for this summer’s seminar was “Environmental Justice.” The weeklong seminar serves competitively selected undergraduate students from a group of Ohio colleges.   Professor Robertson presented a two-hour workshop entitled “Finding a community’s voice through the law of environmental justice.”  Robertson is the Steven W. Percy Distinguished Professor of Law at C|M|LAW, and a Professor of Environmental Studies at the Levin College of Urban Affairs.

On Jan. 8, Clinical Professor of Law Doron Kalir presented at Congregation B’nai Jeshurun’s Tikkun Leil Sha’vu’out. The event, which is community-wide, attracts hundreds for a night of text and Torah Study with Rabbis, theologians, academics, and other thought leaders. Professor Kalir’s presentation this year was titled, “Following Netflix’s Come Sunday: What is Judaism All About?” The presentation explored the rise and fall of Bishop Carlton Pearson as reflected by the bioepic “Come Sunday,” only to return to Judaism and ask what lessons, if any, are relevant from this story to ours. This was Professor Kalir’s fourth annual presentation at this event.

Professor Sterio at The Hague

Professor Milena Sterio presented at The Hague, in the Netherlands, on the topic of “The Legacy of Ad Hoc Tribunals” at the Asser Institute (co-sponsored by the University of Leiden) on June 4th, and at the University of Leiden, Hague Campus, on June 5th.  These presentations, co-delivered with Dean Michael Scharf, Case Western Reserve University School of Law, centered around Professor Sterio’s and Dean Scharf’s new book, entitled “The Legacy of Ad Hoc Tribunals in International Criminal Law” (Cambridge University Press 2019).

Michael Scharf, Judge Chile Eboe-Osuji, and Milena Sterio

In addition, Professor Sterio judged several rounds of the world finals of the International Criminal Court Moot Court competition, and she attended several meetings at the International Criminal Court at The Hague,  with the International Criminal Court presiding judge, Chile Eboe-Osuji (pictured left, center), as well as with Defense Counsel Tom Obhof.

Heidi Gorovitz Robertson, C|M|LAW’s Steven W. Percy Distinguished Professor of Law and Levin College of Urban Affairs Professor of Environmental Studies, traveled to the Association of Law, Property, and Society’s 10th Annual Meeting at Syracuse University College of Law, Syracuse, New York.  On May 18, 2019, she participated on a panel entitled Property Issues in Energy Resources and Infrastructure, and presented, Local efforts to influence natural gas pipeline routing decisions: An Ohio case study.

Professor Milena Sterio presented at the Law and Society Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C., on May 31.  Professor Sterio presented on the topic of “International Law and State Creation: Lawyers as Guardians of the International Galaxy of States,” within a panel entitled “Revisiting Participation in International Legal Process.”  Professor Sterio’s remarks focused on the role of International Law in the processes of state creation and recognition.

Professor Heidi Gorovitz Robertson, C|M|LAW’s Steven W. Percy Distinguished Professor of Law and Levin College of Urban Affairs Professor of Environmental Studies appeared on the 50th episode of the CAP-Impact podcast.  CAP⋅impact provides information, advice and analysis to help people understand and shape the rules around them and is a project of the nonpartisan Capital Center for Law & Policy at McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, California.  On this episode, Professor Robertson discussed community bills of rights, in particular, Toledo’s Lake Erie Bill of Rights, and the rights of nature movement more broadly.

You can listen to the podcast here:

https://www.capimpactca.com/2019/06/podcast-rights-of-nature-heidi-robertson/

Chris Sagers, the James A. Thomas Professor of Law, spoke with several media outlets this week about news that federal regulators may be investigating Big Tech firms for monopolization, including Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Apple. He appeared live on Bloomberg Radio, and was quoted in stories in Agence-France Presse, the Telegraph, Fox Business, Bloomberg Law, and Reuters.

He also spoke with Reuters in a story last week about the Federal Trade Commission’s win against mobile chipmaker Qualcomm. The FTC persuaded a federal district court that Qualcomm had used its dominance in  modem chips to exclude rival manufacturers and squeeze excess profits from mobile device makers. The case has been controversial, and it drew the unprecedented op-ed by a sitting Federal Trade Commissioner–a Republican appointed by President Trump after the agency had first brought the case–publicly calling for her own agency to lose on appeal.

Cleveland-Marshall College of Law has signed a 3+3 agreement with Marietta College, which permits eligible students to complete both their undergraduate and law degrees in 6 rather than 7 years. The agreement is the 8th external 3+3 agreement that C|M Law has signed since 2014, with Marietta College joining Lake Erie College, the University of Findlay, Ursuline College, Notre Dame College, Mercyhurst University, Trine University, and Hiram College. In addition, C|M Law and Cleveland State University have created a similar internal 3+3 program.

On May 17, Professor David Forte presented an address at the Faculty of Law at Jagellonian University in Cracow, Poland, on the subject of “The Moral  Content of the Positive Law.”

On May 29, David Forte gave a lecture at Cardinal Wyszyński University on “Why Marbury v. Madison is the Most Important Case decided by the United States Supreme Court.” He was invited to do so because Poland is confronting an ongoing dispute over parliament’s appointment power of members of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal.

Professor Forte has been serving as the Distinguished Fulbright Chair for the Faculty of Law at the University of Warsaw, Poland.