News for alumni and friends of Indiana Law
August 2021
In this issue:
- From the Dean
- Distinguished Service Award winners announced
- Law School observes Women's Equality Day
- Havill appointed secretary of IU Board of Trustees; Turchi to retire; Hosey and Edwards taking on new responsibilities
- Seventh Circuit rules for petitioner represented by students in habeas corpus project
- Alum's new book reflects on Dean Fromm's legacy
- Faculty news
- Coming events, reunions
- Class notes
From the Dean
The fall semester is under way, and despite being masked-up, we are largely back to normal, with almost all classes meeting in person and with a full schedule of events on the calendar. Vaccination rates are very high in the Law School, and students, faculty, and staff are closely following IU’s health and safety precautions. We are monitoring the situation closely and are following the university’s medical guidance. We have the ability to adjust as needed depending on what happens with the virus and its variants.
On August 13, we welcomed an outstanding class of 192 first-year students—almost 20 more than last year—with a median LSAT of 164, two points above last year's. We also welcomed 29 graduate and exchange students from 17 countries. Fifty-two percent of the Class of 2024 is from outside Indiana, 49% are women, and 24% are minorities. Our 1L class represents 107 undergraduate institutions from 27 states.
The closing ceremony for our orientation program started the academic year out on a positive note. Hon. Doris Pryor, '03, magistrate judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, delivered the keynote address at orientation and administered the oath of professionalism to the incoming class. Our 2020–21 SBA president, Heather Gin, gave remarks, too, and 3L Olivia Potter received this year’s student leadership award after being selected by a committee of faculty, staff, and students for her contributions to supporting our community last year.
The pandemic is causing us to make up for lost time with reunions and other celebrations this fall. We have planned several already, with more to come as the semester unfolds. Please join us this Friday for our first virtual alumni reception for the fall (registration and details below). Watch for emails later in the semester as plans take shape. It’s also an exciting time on campus as IU’s new president, Pamela Whitten, and IU Bloomington Provost John Applegate step into their roles.
Austen Parrish
Dean and James H. Rudy Professor of Law
Distinguished Service Award winners announced
Four alumni have been selected to receive the Law School's Distinguished Service Award; Elizabeth (Libby) Baney, '07, Shakeba DuBose, '04, Hon. Jose M. Rodriguez, Jr., '80, and Leah Seigel, '14.
Libby Baney has been an active Law School volunteer during the 14 years since her graduation. She served for 12 years on the school's Alumni Board, recently completing a term as its president. She has also served as a mentor to students and as an invaluable resource for the Career Services office in Washington, DC, where she is a partner at Faegre Drinker.
Baney's practice focuses on issues relating to digital health, including internet pharmacies and pharmacy compliance, telemedicine, telehealth, and drug price transparency. A prolific speaker and writer, Baney is a frequent contributor to strategic workshops, conferences and publications such as the Los Angeles Times and USA Today.
Shakeba DuBose is the founding member of the Dubose Law Firm and DDLF Health Care Compliance Consulting Group, which offer legal and compliance consulting services to healthcare providers and health services organizations in Columbus, Ohio. Before starting the firm in 2013, she worked for the Ohio Attorney General’s Office, Health and Human Services Division, as an assistant attorney and for CareSource Management Group as an associate. DuBose has been a member of the BLSA Alumni Advisory Board since 2007. In 2012 she became president of the board and has been one of its most engaged leaders since the board's founding in 2004. During her term in leadership, she was known for keeping the board focused through quarterly phone calls and creating special projects such as board mentoring.
DuBose has been a mentor to countless African American students at the Law School, frequently traveling from her home in Columbus to hold student sessions focusing on how to get on a law journal, be successful in Moot Court, and pass the bar. She recently joined the adjunct faculty, teaching health care law during the school’s Wintersession.
Judge Rodriguez is a judge for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Court, Civil Division, in Miami–Dade County, Fla. He was first appointed to the Circuit Court bench in 2000 by former Governor Jeb Bush and was re-elected to the post in 2014. Prior to his appointment, Judge Rodriguez sat as a judge for the Miami–Dade County Court after receiving an appointment to the position by former Governor Lawton Chiles in 1994. He is an adjunct faculty member for the Law School, teaching courtroom procedure during Wintersession; he is also an adjunct faculty member at Florida International University School of Law.
For the past 15 years, Judge Rodriguez has provided extraordinary support and mentorship to IU students, taking many students as externs in his chambers. In 2018, he and fellow alumnus Luis Navarro, '00, established the Judge Jose M. Rodriguez Law Scholar program, which creates a summer position for qualified diverse students interested in practicing in Miami. Judge Rodriguez has been a member of the Latino Alumni Advisory Board since 2013, currently serving as board president, and he joined the Alumni Board in 2018.
Leah Seigel is being recognized under the award's young alumni category. In January of this year, she joined Lilly Endowment Inc. as program director for community development. Previously she was an associate at Barnes & Thornburg in Indianapolis, where she focused on appellate and intellectual property litigation. Before joining Barnes & Thornburg, she clerked for Hon. Mark S. Massa of the Indiana Supreme Court. In 2019 she was recognized with an Up-and-Coming Leadership in Law Award by The Indiana Lawyer.
Seigel has extensive experience on boards of nonprofit organizations, including the Indiana Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Happy Hollow Children’s Camp. In addition to service to her community, she has been a tremendous resource for the Law School's Career Services Office and as a founding member of the Young Alumni Steering Committee representing the Indianapolis area.
This year's recipients will be recognized in a ceremony during the Alumni Board meeting on October 1. Students in the school's first-year Legal Profession course will be invited to attend.
Law School observes Women's Equality Day
On August 26 the Law School will observe Women's Equality Day, which commemorates the 19th Amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing suffrage for women. On August 23 ten of our students, several graduates, and members of faculty and staff attended the Indiana State Bar Association’s Bench and Bar 19th Amendment Celebration, which recognized a number of our trailblazing alumnae.
“Beginning with Tamar Althouse Scholz, our first woman graduate, in 1892, and continuing to this year’s first-year class, which is 49% female, the Law School is justifiably proud of the contributions of its women students and alumnae to the legal profession and to the promotion of justice and the rule of law,” said Dean Parrish.
The school has announced plans to honor alumnae who have advanced equal rights for women in the legal profession during the past century. These events commemorate the important role of women in its past, present, and future:
- The introduction of a collection of oral histories of several Title IX activists in the school’s Jerome Hall Law Library The collection features interviews with several Title IX activists from the early 1970s, including women in government with responsibility for implementing Title IX, women who worked with interest groups, especially the National Organizational for Women (NOW) and the Women’s Equity Action League (WEAL). Former Indiana Senator Birch Bayh, ’60, the only man in these oral histories, is included as the original sponsor of Title IX in Congress. Professor Emerita Julia Lamber, ’72, co-directed the oral history project. An expert on Title IX, Lamber is the former IU dean for women’s affairs and the Law School’s first associate dean for clinical education. She co-authored an essay, “A Forgotten History: The Women Who Brought Us Title IX,” which accompanies the collection.
- Dean Parrish, Dean Anne McFadden, and other faculty, staff, and students represented the Law School at the Indiana State Bar Association’s Bench and Bar Celebration of the 19th Amendment on August 23. Hon V. Sue Shields, ’61, the first woman to serve on the Indiana Court of Appeals and the first woman magistrate judge for the US District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, will be honored. Alumnae Hon. Elaine B. Brown, ’82, Hon. Linda L. Chezem, ’71, and Hon. Martha Blood Wentworth, ’90, and Chief Justice Loretta H. Rush, ’83, will also be recognized.
- New banners have recently been installed outside Baier Hall, the school’s main building, saluting Hon. Shirley Abrahamson, ’56, the first woman to serve on the Wisconsin Supreme Court and its first female chief justice and Hon. Flerida Pineda Romero, ’55, a former Supreme Court Justice in the Philippines. Previous banners have honored Tamar Althouse Scholz, 1892, and Hon. Juanita Kidd Stout, ’48, LLM ’54, the nation’s first African American state supreme court justice.
- Later this fall, the school will celebrate the naming of the school’s Moot Court Room in honor of Kathleen DeLaney, ’95, and her mother, Ann DeLaney, ’77, two pathbreaking lawyers in Indianapolis who have endowed a scholarship fund for women pursuing careers in litigation.
- Portraits have been placed behind the bench in the DeLaney Moot Court Room honoring four pioneering alumnae: Judge Shields, Justice Stout, Judge Chezem, the first woman appointed to a circuit court in Indiana and the second woman to serve on the Indiana Court of Appeals, and Justice Rush, Indiana’s first woman chief justice.
- The school is observing its seventh year of its partnership program with prestigious women’s colleges throughout the country. Law students from these schools receive a scholarship and participate in a mentoring program. Women’s colleges in this innovative program are Bryn Mawr, Cottey, Mills, Mount Holyoke, Smith, Vassar, and Wellesley.
Parrish noted that women also play a significant role in the leadership of the Law School and the university. Its former dean, Lauren Robel, ’83, also served as provost of IU–Bloomington for 12 years. The school’s current, former, and acting executive associate deans, and its associate dean for research and faculty affairs are women. Executive Associate Dean Christiana Ochoa is the first woman of color to serve in that position in the school’s more-than-175-year history. In addition, he said, four of the school’s six assistant deans are women, and another female assistant dean was recently elected secretary of IU’s Board of Trustees.
Women's Equality Day is celebrated in the United States on August 26 to commemorate the 1920 adoption of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which prohibits the states and the federal government from denying the right to vote to citizens of the United States on the basis of sex. It was first celebrated in 1971, designated by Congress in 1973, and is proclaimed each year by the President of the United States.
Havill appointed secretary of IU Board of Trustees; Turchi to retire; Hosey and Edwards taking on new responsibilities
Changes are happening with the Law School’s senior leadership team. Andrea Havill, assistant dean for external affairs and alumni relations, has been elected secretary of the Indiana University Board of Trustees, effective August 12. Ken Turchi, '83, after more than a decade with the law school, will be retiring and relocating to Charleston, SC. Lisa Hosey and Mary Edwards are being promoted and taking on new responsibilities.
Havill has been a key part of the law school’s senior leadership for almost 17 years. She joined the school in 2004 and was named assistant dean for alumni relations in 2006. Her responsibilities expanded to include external affairs in 2014. In recent years, she has overseen the creation of our Young Alumni Steering Committee, the expansion of the number and scope of our alumni receptions nationwide, and the development of city groups. She also played a key role in establishing the school's Global Advisory Board, moving forward a variety of behind-the-scenes data projects, successfully completing the Bicentennial Capital Campaign, and implementing a number of new alumni engagement initiatives. Under Havill's leadership, the Law School established a new Distinguished Alumni Service Award for junior alumni, added outstanding new members to our boards, inducted inspiring graduates to our Academy of Law Alumni Fellows, and arranged for a U.S. Supreme Court swearing-in ceremony for our graduates.
Turchi’s almost 12-year tenure with the Law School has led to significant improvements in communications and external engagement. He joined the Law School in 2009 as assistant dean for communications and marketing, and then in 2014 assumed the role of assistant dean for communications and administration to reflect a broader profile with responsibilities related to human resources, law school technology, longer-term planning, and facilities. In recent years, under Turchi’s leadership, the Law School embraced new faculty and staff recognition initiatives, saw a record number of faculty quoted and interviewed in local and national media, and revamped and overhauled its website.
Turchi played a key role in a variety of facilities improvement projects, including the installation of new wood floors and carpets, the remodeling of several classrooms, the securing of Henderson House to accommodate the growing success of the Law School’s research centers and the refurnishing of the first floor. He has also overseen a number of visibility initiatives within the law school, along with being an integral part of the school’s ABA site inspection and reaccreditation, and the Association of American Law School’s membership review process. He is the author of three books, including Looking Forward, Giving Back: The Jewish Merchants of Downtown Indianapolis, which will be published this fall.
Turchi will remain active with the school throughout December. For the next two years, during retirement, he will continue to oversee the production and publication of the Law School’s alumni magazine, ergo.
While the Law School congratulates Havill on her promotion and Turchi on his well-deserved retirement, we will miss them both. Two current members of senior staff will step into assume greater responsibilities as the Law School conducts searches for new staff. Lisa Hosey, executive director of development, will be promoted to assistant dean of advancement and will assume responsibilities overseeing both the alumni relations and development functions of the Arthur M. Lotz Office of Alumni and Development. She steps into the position with over two decades of alumni and development experience. Mary Edwards, executive director of fiscal affairs, who has been with the Law School for more than a decade, will be promoted to assistant dean of finance and administration, assuming additional oversight responsibilities related to human resources, technology, and facilities. The school is in the process of hiring a director of development and a director of communications, with more details to come.
Seventh Circuit rules for petitioner represented by student in Federal Habeas Project
Willow Thomas, ’21, a student in the school's Federal Habeas Practicum, scored a victory for her client in the Seventh Circuit on August 5 when the court dismissed the state's appeal of a conditional writ in Brown v. Vanihel. Thomas argued the case in June under the supervision of Adjunct Professor Michael Ausbrook, '93. The court's holding reversed the conviction and 60-year sentence imposed in 2009 on a 14-year-old boy who was arrested at 13 and tried as an adult.
The practicum familiarizes students with the fundamentals of federal habeas corpus litigation as they work on real cases. Students in the course study the basic statutes, rules, and case law that govern habeas litigation. They also conduct legal research, draft documents connected with filings, and investigate the facts of current or potential cases. When possible, students also visit clients in Indiana prisons.
The Law School's website has more information about the Brown case and the Federal Habeas Practicum.
Alum's new book reflects on Dean Fromm's legacy
In his new book, Positively Conflicted, Sam Ardery, '83, shows us that a rich and fulfilling life comes from becoming good at managing conflict in the broadest sense—including personal, professional, and family traumas. Ardery recounts the influence of the late Leonard D. Fromm, the school's longtime dean of students, who supported him during a crisis that led to self-discovery.
William Henderson, Stephen F. Burns Professor of Law, reviews Ardery's new book in Legal Evolution, which he edits. Henderson notes that when Fromm was diagnosed with an aggressive form of terminal cancer in 2012, he chose Ardery as his lawyer. "Positively Conflicted helped me understand why," Henderson wrote.
Faculty news
The Law School's Tax Policy Colloquium and Intellectual Property Colloquium begin this week, each with an outstanding schedule of speakers.
Profs. Jay Krishnan and Jessica Eaglin participated in the Emerging Scholars Workshop, hosted by the University of Chicago Law School on May 24.
On May 27 Prof. Leandra Lederman presented research entitled “Best Practices in Tax Rulings Transparency” in a panel on international taxation as part of the 2021 Law and Society Association Conference.
Dean Austen Parrish participated in the Open Conversations Series on Racism and Racial Injustice hosted by the Indiana State Bar Association on May 27.
On June 2, Prof. Steve Sanders participated in a panel discussion entitled, “Meriwether Case: Is All Classroom Speech Free Speech?” sponsored by the Academic Freedom Alliance.
Prof. Asaf Lubin moderated a panel session on cyber security as part of the 2021 Privacy Law Scholars Conference on June 4.
Coming events, reunions
Join Dean Parrish for virtual alumni receptions on:
- Friday, August 27 at noon EDT. Register here
- Friday, September 10 at noon EDT. Register here.
- Thursday, September 16 at 4:00 EDT. Register here.
Members of the Classes of 1995, 1996, 2010, and 2011: Plan to attend reunions on Saturday, October 2.
Members of the Classes of 1970 and 1971: Your reunions are on Friday, October 1 and Saturday October 2.
For details, reservations, and any pandemic-related updates, visit the Alumni Weekend website.
Class notes
Be sure to follow the Law School on Facebook and Twitter for the most up-to-date news on the Law School community. For more information about your classmates, and to submit your own news, visit our class notes page.
Read In the media for faculty quotes and op-eds in state and national media.