Law News - College of Law

Lawless writes op-ed on venue shopping for Bloomberg

“For any court process to be seen as fair, people must see the judge as unbiased and believe the judge based the decision only on the evidence presented,” Professor Robert Lawless writes in an opinion article published by Bloomberg Law. Though this statement seems uncontroversial, the practice of “venue shopping” for bankruptcy proceedings undermines the credibility of the courts. Lawless writes that some bankruptcy judges have openly admitted wanting to attract large Chapter 11 cases, which makes their decisions seem less than legitimate, a problem that must be remedied.

Read his full op-ed online.

Winship publishes review on JOTWELL

In the world of technology, there is a maxim about the division of labor that states, “The US produces technology and the EU produces rules.” This is the center of a new article by Anu Bradford, which was recently reviewed by Professor Verity Winship. In her review, Winship notes “Bradford’s super-power as a scholar is the ability to take something that has been recognized and analyzed in piecemeal form, and then to enlarge the framework and fundamentally shift how we talk about the area.” By applying this “super-power” to the US-EU technological rights conflict, Bradford creates an article that is “sophisticated, timely…well worth a read.”

Read Winship’s review on JOTWELL.

Real Clear History quotes Keenan on starvation as a war crime

After the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, citing war crimes and crimes against humanity, including starvation, Real Clear History put together a primer on how starvation went from a tactic to a war crime. Professor Patrick Keenan helped provide some context, sharing details about the use of starvation in the U.S. Civil War.

Read the full explainer on Real Clear History.

Hurd and Moore deliver keynote lectures at Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law

Professors Heidi M. Hurd and Michael Moore delivered keynote lectures at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law in Freiburg, Germany, as part of a multi-day, international, multi-disciplinary conference on the topic of Criminal Liability for Negligence. Hurd spoke about the topic of Criminal Responsibility for Carelessness and Moore spoke about Defending a Choice-Based Theory of Criminal Responsibility. Attending the conference were leading criminal law scholars in law, psychology, political science, and philosophy across Europe and within Anglo-American legal systems.

STAT quotes Sherkow on pharmaceutical patents

The practice of using “patent thickets,” which allow pharmaceutical companies to delay low-cost generic medicines reaching the market, is being targeted by a rule change proposed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The change would reduce the number of terminal disclaimers, an important part of patent thickets, which offers the potential to speed the entry of generic drugs to the market, Professor Jacob Sherkow explained to STAT. He cautioned, however, that companies may still find clever ways to skirt the rules.

Read the full article from STAT.

Deseret News published op-ed from Wilson on Right to Contraception Act

Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs, there has been a concerted effort among lawmakers to codify the right to access contraception. This manifested itself this summer in Senate Bill 4381, which Professor Robin Wilson says is “a worthy legislative endeavor,” with the caveat that “it needs to be done with sensitivity to our constitutional design.” In her opinion article, published in the Deseret News, she suggests that this is a great chance for Congress to come together in a bipartisan fashion to create a good piece of legislation.

Read her op-ed online.

Keenan co-authors Tribune op-ed on international arrest warrants

Writing with Leila Sadat of Washington University, Professor Patrick Keenan argues President Biden has been misguided in his criticism of arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Israel and Gaza. “The law must be applied impartially to all. The U.S. should not stand behind the court when it issues warrants against U.S. adversaries such as Russia and then seek to retaliate against it for pursuing warrants in a situation in which a U.S. ally is concerned,” Keenan and Sadat wrote in their opinion piece.

Read the full article on the Chicago Tribune website.

Sherkow authors new article on DNA trade secrecy

Hallene Gateway at University of Illinois

Whether or not DNA sequences are subject to trade secrecy protections is the critical question examined by Professor Jacob Sherkow in his latest article, published in the Hastings Law Journal. Despite decades of scholarship assuming DNA sequences would be subject to protection, recent research has suggested this assumption was incorrect. Sherkow explores why DNA sequences might not be protected as well as the implications of this change.

Read the full article online.

Amar and Mazzone recap SCOTUS term at Justia

Professors Vikram Amar and Jason Mazzone take aim at the perception that the Supreme Court has taken a hard-right turn in their latest article written for Justia Verdict. “In the current term, at least, the Court has not been consistently conservative in a partisan way. Nor has the Court been particularly aggressive in taking up and deciding hot-button issues,” they write. Their opinion article examines the 2023-24 session and how a federal circuit court might be more to blame for the misperception of the nation’s highest court.

Read the full article online.

Illinois Law welcomes five new faculty hires

The University of Illinois College of Law is thrilled to welcome five new faculty members to our roster this fall.

Sara Gerke joins Illinois as an Associate Professor of Law and Richard W. & Marie L. Corman Scholar. Her research focuses on the ethical and legal challenges of artificial intelligence and big data for health care and health law in the United States and Europe. She also researches comparative law and ethics of other issues at the cutting edge of medical developments, such as the clinical translation of stem cell research, biological products, such as somatic cells, tissues, and gene therapy, reproductive medicine, such as mitochondrial replacement techniques, and digital health more generally. Professor Gerke has over 60 publications in health law and bioethics, and her work has appeared in leading law, medical, scientific, and bioethics journals. Professor Gerke earned a JD from University of Augsburg and an MA from King’s College London.

Bill Watson joins Illinois as an Assistant Professor of Law. His work has focused on the intersection of public law and philosophy and has appeared or is forthcoming in law reviews like the Northwestern University Law Review and Boston University Law Review, as well as peer-reviewed journals like Law and Philosophy and Legal Theory. He is currently working on projects that address originalism in constitutional interpretation, the import of legal positivism for legal interpretation, and the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent treatment of precedent. Professor Watson received his JD from the University of Chicago Law School and his PhD in Philosophy from Cornell University. He was a Climenko Fellow and Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School immediately prior to joining the University of Illinois faculty.

Jingkang (Jake) Gao joins Illinois as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Law. In his work, he has explored how legal institutions can make urban mobility safer, cleaner, more accessible, and more equitable, and how insights from urban mobility can enrich the study of law. He has applied his background in law in his work with the Chicago Transit Authority on facilitating bus electrification and cultivating a healthier electric bus market in the United States. Professor Gao earned his JD from Columbia Law School and his PhD and an MS from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Maxim Krupskiy joins Illinois as a Visiting Scholar, as part of the Illinois Scholars at Risk program. He has more than twelve years of experience practicing law in Russia defending refugees and civil activists and, as an independent expert, has prepared more than forty independent anti-corruption expert opinions. Krupskiy recently spent time as a Visiting Scholar at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a Non-Resident Fellow at the George Washington University, Russia Program.

Benjamin Horton joins Illinois as a Visiting Lecturer in Law and Stanton Fellow with our First Amendment Clinic. He was inspired to pursue a legal education during the 2016 presidential election and focused his education on free expression and election issues, participating in several clinics and interning for the Center for Democracy and Technology. After completing his JD at Harvard Law School, Horton spent a year with Free Speech For People, an election litigation nonprofit, and two years clerking in the District of Massachusetts.

The College of Law is proud to have these individuals joining our faculty and looks forward to their accomplishments as part of the University of Illinois.