News Center

This Week's Experts – February 20, 2007

Overview

Stanford Law School faculty are available to offer legal analysis/commentary on the following news topics this week:

World

  • Iran - Nuclear Weapons/EFPs
  • North Korean Nuclear Disarmament
  • Iraqi Security Plan

Nation

  • Big Tobacco - Supreme Court Ruling for Philip Morris
  • GITMO - Appeals Ruling Against Detainees
  • U.S. House Iraq Resolution
  • I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Perjury & Obstruction Trial
  • Climate Change/U.S. Government Reports/UN Report/Rising Sea Levels/China
  • Supreme Court Upcoming Hearings
    • Microsoft v. AT&T/Patent Act
    • Jay Hein v. Freedom From Religion Foundation/Establishment Clause
  • U.S. Business
    • Sirius-XM Merger
    • Stock Option Backdating
    • SEC Moves to Stop Investor Suits
    • SEC Probe into "Frontrunning"/Insider Trading

California

  • State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform
    • Proposed Sentencing Commission, Little Hoover Commission Report
    • SCOTUS Ruling on California Sentencing - Cunningham v. California
    • Prison Overcrowding

World

Iran - Nuclear Weapons/EFPs

Allen S. Weiner
Associate Professor of Law (Teaching), Warren Christopher Professor of the Practice of International Law and Diplomacy, and Co-director of the Center on International Conflict and Resolution
650 724.5892 or 650 724.4818
Expertise: Contemporary Security Threats, International Security, Nuclear Proliferation, International Law, Laws of War, Human Rights

North Korean Nuclear Disarmament

Allen S. Weiner
Associate Professor of Law (Teaching), Warren Christopher Professor of the Practice of International Law and Diplomacy, and Co-director of the Center on International Conflict and Resolution
650 724.5892 or 650 724.4818
Expertise: Contemporary Security Threats, International Security, Nuclear Proliferation, International Law, Laws of War, Human Rights

Iraqi Security Plan

Allen S. Weiner
Associate Professor of Law (Teaching), Warren Christopher Professor of the Practice of International Law and Diplomacy, and Co-director of the Center on International Conflict and Resolution
650 724.5892 or 650 724.4818
Expertise: Contemporary Security Threats, International Security, Nuclear Proliferation, International Law, Laws of War, Human Rights

Nation

Big Tobacco - Supreme Court Ruling for Philip Morris

Deborah R. Hensler
Judge John W. Ford Professor of Dispute Resolution and Associate Dean for Graduate Studies
650 723.0146
Expertise: Mass Tort Liability, Dispute Resolution, Complex Litigation

GITMO - Appeals Ruling Against Detainees

Jenny S. Martinez
Associate Professor of Law
650 725.2749
Expertise: Separation of Powers, Civil Procedure and Litigation, Comparative Law, Constitutional Law, Human Rights, International Law, Detention related to Terrorism/GITMO

U.S. House Iraq Resolution

Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar
Associate Professor of Law and Deane F. Johnson Faculty Scholar
650 723.9216
Expertise: International Law and the Economy, Separation of Powers

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Perjury & Obstruction Trial

Robert Weisberg
Edwin E. Huddleson, Jr. Professor of Law and Director of the Stanford Criminal Justice Center
650 723.0612
Expertise: Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Criminal Procedure, Defense Strategy, White Collar Crime, Grand Juries

Climate Change/U.S. Government Reports/UN Report/Rising Sea Levels/China

Margaret "Meg" Caldwell
Director, Environmental and Natural Resources Law and Policy Program; Senior Lecturer, Stanford Institute for the Environment
650 723.4057
Expertise: Coastal Law, Science, and Policy; Environmental and Natural Resources Law. She is also former chair of the California Coastal Commission and an expert on the implications of rising sea levels.
Deborah A. "Debbie" Sivas
Director, Environmental Law Clinic and Lecturer in Law
650 723.0325
Expertise: Environmental Law, Climate Change/Global Warming, litigates environmental protection cases in federal courts

Supreme Court Upcoming Hearings: Microsoft v. AT&T/Patent Act

Mark A. Lemley
William H. Neukom Professor of Law and Director, Stanford Program in Law, Science and Technology
650 723.4605
Expertise: Intellectual Property (Patents, Trademarks, Copyright), Technology and the Law

Supreme Court Upcoming Hearings: Jay Hein v. Freedom From Religion Foundation/Establishment Clause

Andrew Coan
John C. Gaither Fellow
650 736.9770
Expertise: Constitutional Law, Federal Courts, Administrative Law

U.S. Business: Sirius-XM Merger

Mark A. Lemley
William H. Neukom Professor of Law and Director, Stanford Program in Law, Science and Technology
650 723.4605
Expertise: Antitrust, Technology and the Law

U.S. Business: Stock Option Backdating

Joseph A. Grundfest
W. A. Franke Professor of Law and Business, Co-director of the Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance
650 723.0458
Expertise: Corporate Law, Securities Regulation, Mergers and Acquisitions, Venture Capital

U.S. Business: SEC Moves to Stop Investor Suits

Joseph A. Grundfest
W. A. Franke Professor of Law and Business, Co-director of the Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance
650 723.0458
Expertise: Corporate Law, Securities Regulation, Mergers and Acquisitions, Venture Capital

U.S. Business: SEC Probe into "Frontrunning"/Insider Trading

Joseph A. Grundfest
W. A. Franke Professor of Law and Business, Co-director of the Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance
650 723.0458
Expertise: Corporate Law, Securities Regulation, Mergers and Acquisitions, Venture Capital

California

State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform: Proposed Sentencing Commission, Little Hoover Commission Report

Kara Dansky
Executive Director, Stanford Criminal Justice Center
650 724.5786
Expertise: Criminal Law, Criminal Sentencing Policy, Member of California's Little Hoover Commission
Robert Weisberg
Edwin E. Huddleson, Jr. Professor of Law
650 723.0612
Expertise: Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Criminal Procedure

State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform: SCOTUS Ruling on California Sentencing - Cunningham v. California

Kara Dansky
Executive Director, Stanford Criminal Justice Center
650 724.5786
Expertise: Criminal Law, Criminal Sentencing Policy, Member of California's Little Hoover Commission
Robert Weisberg
Edwin E. Huddleson, Jr. Professor of Law
650 723.0612
Expertise: Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Criminal Procedure

State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform: Prison Overcrowding

Kara Dansky
Executive Director, Stanford Criminal Justice Center
650 724.5786
Expertise: Criminal Law, Criminal Sentencing Policy, Member of California's Little Hoover Commission
Robert Weisberg
Edwin E. Huddleson, Jr. Professor of Law
650 723.0612
Expertise: Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Criminal Procedure


Bios

Margaret “Meg” Caldwell

Caldwell is the former chair of the California Coastal Commission, and also serves on the board of the California Coastal Conservancy and as a member of California Marine Life Protection Act Blue Ribbon Task Force. She is an expert on the environmental effects of local land use decisions, the use of science in environmental and marine resource policy development and implementation, and developing private and public incentives for natural resource conservation, as well as implications of rising sea levels. Caldwell holds a joint appointment as a Senior Lecturer with the Woods Institute for the Environment.

Andrew Coan

Coan is a 2005 graduate of Stanford Law School who was selected for the prestigious John C. Gaither fellowship, a two-year appointment designed to support promising graduates seeking to make a transition into careers for which additional time for research is essential. Prior to starting the fellowship, he clerked for Judge Richard Posner of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Coan’s principle areas of interest include constitutional law, federal courts, and administrative law.

Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar

Cuéllar is an affiliated faculty member with the Stanford Center for International Security and Cooperation and served as senior advisor to the U.S. Treasury Department's Under Secretary for Enforcement. He has published the leading academic paper on the operation of federal money laundering laws. Cuéllar is an expert on complex criminal, regulatory, and transnational problems, and the federal and international organizations responsible for managing them.

Kara Dansky

Dansky is an expert on California sentencing policy and a member of the Little Hoover Commission Advisory Committee on Sentencing Reform. Previously, she was a staff attorney, with the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and a staff attorney for the Society of Counsel Representing Accused Persons.

Joseph A. Grundfest

Grundfest, a former SEC Commissioner, is a nationally prominent expert on capital markets, corporate governance, and securities litigation. He has served on the staff of the President's Council of Economic Advisors as counsel and senior economist for legal and regulatory matters. Grundfest heads the award-winning Securities Class Action Clearinghouse and co-directs the Arthur and Toni Rembe Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford Law School.

Deborah R. Hensler

Hensler, a political scientist who formerly directed the RAND Institute for Civil Justice, has won national recognition for her research on dispute resolution, complex litigation, and mass tort liability. She has testified before state and federal legislatures on issues ranging from alternative dispute resolution to asbestos litigation and mass torts, and consulted with judges and lawyers outside of the United States on the design of class action regimes. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Political and Social Science and serves on the board of overseers for the RAND Institute for Civil Justice.

Mark A. Lemley

Lemley, a preeminent scholar of intellectual property law, has published over 70 articles and six books, and tried cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, the California Supreme Court, and federal district courts. His legal scholarship focuses on how the economics and technology of the Internet affect patent law, copyright law, and trademark law. Professor Lemley has testified numerous times before Congress and the California legislature on patent, trade secret, antitrust, and constitutional law matters.

Jenny S. Martinez

Martinez argued the 2004 case of Rumsfeld v. Padilla in the U.S. Supreme Court, seeking to clarify the constitutional protections available to post-9/11 "enemy combatants" who are U.S. citizens. Martinez performed the rare feat of a clerkship triple crown, clerking on a federal appellate court, the United States Supreme Court (with Justice Stephen Breyer), and the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (with Judge Patricia Wald). Martinez's scholarship makes the first major attempt to synthesize and analyze the important new phenomenon of an increasing number of international tribunals operating in a globalized environment, but without any supervening sovereign authority to which they are all bound.

Deborah A. "Debbie" Sivas

Sivas has been the Director of the Stanford Environmental Law Clinic since 1997. She is a 1987 Stanford Law School graduate, clerked for a federal court, serves as president of the board for two NGOs, and has litigated many significant environmental cases in federal court on behalf of nonprofit organizations.

Allen S. Weiner

Weiner is the co-director of the Stanford Center on International Conflict and Resolution. For more than a decade, he served at the United States Department of State, first as Attorney-Adviser in the Office of the Legal Adviser, and then as Attaché and Counselor for Legal Affairs in the United States Embassy in The Hague. He is an expert on international law and the response to the contemporary security threats of international terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, including in North Korea and Iran.

Robert Weisberg

Weisberg is director of the Stanford Criminal Justice Center. A frequent commentator and expert on white-collar crime, criminal law and procedure, sentencing, and criminal justice reform, he has served as a consulting attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and the California Appellate Project, working on death penalty litigation in the federal courts. He is also versed in commercial law and secured transactions.