News Center

This Week's Experts – August 7, 2007

Overview

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

World

  • Chinese Product Safety and Regulation
  • Iraq Security Plan
  • Darfur
    • Economic Sanctions
    • Refugee Crisis
    • International Crimes

Nation

  • Guantanamo
  • Surveillance Bill
  • US Business
    • Brocade Verdict/Stock Options Backdating
    • Insider Trading
    • Securities
    • Hedge Fund & Private Equity Tax
    • Subprime Loan Market
    • Microsoft Patent Ruling Overturned
  • Bridge Collapse Liability
  • Alberto R. Gonzales

California

  • Pedro Guzman/Wrongful Deportation
  • State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform
    • California Sentencing Legislation
    • Prison Funding
    • Assembly Appropriations Report
    • Proposed Sentencing Commission, Little Hoover Commission Report
    • Prison Overcrowding

World

Chinese Product Safety and Regulation

Alan O. Sykes
Professor of Law
650 723.0178
Expertise: Antitrust, Contracts, Insurance, International Law, International Trade, Law and Economics, Torts

Iraq 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

Darfur: Economic Sanctions

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

Darfur: Refugee Crisis

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

Darfur: International Crimes

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

Nation

Guantanamo

Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar
Professor of Law and Deane F. Johnson Faculty Scholar
650 723.9216
Expertise: International Criminal Law, International Security, Separation of Powers
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 / GTMO
Barbara Olshansky
Leah Kaplan Visiting Professor in Human Rights
650 736.2312
Expertise: International Human Rights Law, International Humanitarian Law, Detention related to Terrorism / GTMO, Immigrants' Rights, Prisoners' Rights, Native American Rights, Environmental Law, Public Health, Race Discrimination in Employment and Education.

Surveillance Bill

Derek Shaffer
Executive Director, Stanford Constitutional Law Center
650 723.7739
Expertise:Constitutional law, unsettled constitutional and statutory questions, complex litigation

US Business-Brocade Verdict/Stock Options 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

US Business-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

US Business-Securities

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

US Business-Hedge Fund & Private Equity Tax

Joseph Bankman
Ralph M. Parsons Professor of Law and Business
650 725.3825
Expertise: Business and Corporate Law, Law and Economics, Taxation

US Business-Subprime Loan Market

G. Marcus Cole
Professor of Law, The Helen L. Crocker Faculty Scholar, and Associate Dean for Curriculum
650 723.9216
Expertise: Bankruptcy, Commercial Law, Contracts, Venture Capital

US Business-Microsoft Patent Ruling Overturned

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

Bridge Collapse Liability

Robert L. Rabin
A. Calder Mackay Professor of Law
650 723.3073
Expertise: Torts, Regulation of Health and Safety

Alberto R. Gonzales

Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar
Professor of Law and Deane F. Johnson Faculty Scholar
650 723.9216
Expertise: International Criminal Law, International Security, Separation of Powers
Deborah L. Rhode
Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law
650 723.0319
Expertise:Antidiscrimination Law, Ethics and Professional Responsibility, Sex and the Law (Attorney Dismissals)

California

Pedro Guzman/Wrongful Deportation

Jayashri Srikantiah
Associate Professor of Law (Teaching)
Expertise: Civil Rights, Immigration Law

State Prisons & Criminal Sentencing Reform: California Sentencing Legislation

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 Funding

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: Assembly Appropriations 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: 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: 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

Joseph Bankman

A leading scholar in the field of tax law, Bankman is the author of two widely used casebooks on the subject. His writings on tax policy cover topics such as progressivity, consumption tax, and the role of tax in the structure of Silicon Valley start-ups. He has testified before Congress and other legislative bodies on tax compliance problems posed by the cash economy and worked with the State of California, coauthoring a bill that helps to simplify tax filing by giving low-income taxpayers the option of receiving a ReadyReturn--a completed tax return prepared by the state.

G. Marcus Cole

Cole takes an empirical law and economics approach to research questions such as why corporate bankruptcies increasingly are adjudicated in Delaware, and what drives the financial structure of companies backed by venture capital. He has been a national fellow at the Hoover Institution, and has scholarly interests that range from classical liberal political theory to natural law and the history of commercial law. In November 2006, Cole was part of a group of regulatory experts, who, represented by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, filed a amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to uphold federal preemption in Watters v. Wachovia Bank.

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. Recent projects address the role of criminal enforcement in managing transnational threats, the physical safety of refugee communities in the developing world, legislative and budgetary dynamics affecting the federal Department of Homeland Security, and the impact of bureaucratic structure on how institutions implement legal mandates.

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.

Mark A. Lemley

Widely recognized as a preeminent scholar of intellectual property law, Mark Lemley is a prolific writer, having published over 70 articles and six books, and an accomplished litigator, having tried cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, the California Supreme Court, and federal district courts. His major contributions to legal scholarship focus 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 and currently serves as of counsel at Keker & Van Nest in their intellectual property and antitrust divisions.

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.

Barbara Olshansky

Known for her groundbreaking work on the 2004 Rasul v. Bush case, in which the Supreme Court of the United States overruled a lower court ruling and found that American courts have jurisdiction over claims brought by Guantanamo detainees who are foreign nationals, Olshansky is a leading voice in international human rights and humanitarian law. Prior to her appointment at Stanford Law, she led the Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative at the Center for Constitutional Rights and served as CCR's deputy legal director litigating civil and human rights cases and supervising new lawyers. She has also served as a union-side labor and plaintiff's employment discrimination lawyer and argued cases for the Environmental Defense Fund.

Robert L. Rabin

An expert on torts and legislative compensation schemes, Robert Rabin is highly regarded for his extensive knowledge of the history and institutional dynamics of accident law. He is a prolific author on issues relating to the functions of the tort system and alternative regulatory schemes, and is the coeditor of a classic casebook on tort law. Professor Rabin is currently an advisor to the ongoing American Law Institute Restatement of Torts Third project, and has served as a reporter for the American Law Institute Project on Compensation and Liability for Product and Process Injuries and the American Bar Association Action Commission to Improve the Tort Liability System.

Deborah L. Rhode

Rhode, one of the nation's leading scholars in the fields of legal ethics and professional responsibility, is a prolific author of articles and books on the regulation and reform of the legal profession. She is the founding director of Stanford University's Center on Ethics and she has headed Stanford Law SchoolÕs Keck Center on Legal Ethics and the Legal Profession. A former president of the Association of American Law Schools, Professor Rhode is also a regular columnist for the National Law Journal.

Derek Shaffer

Shaffer specializes in complex litigation matters, particularly those involving governmental bodies and unsettled constitutional and statutory questions. He has variously served as lead counsel and lead associate in several high-profile trial and appellate matters, with clients that have included six states, and in tribunals that have included the United States Supreme Court, numerous United States Courts of Appeals and District Courts, state supreme courts, and the United States Court of Federal Claims.

Jayashri Srikantiah

Jayashri Srikantiah is the director of the law school's Immigrants' Rights Clinic, in which students represent individual immigrants and immigrants' rights organizations and also engage in community outreach, public education, and policy advocacy. She has litigated extensively on behalf of immigrants, and her experience includes challenges to mandatory and indefinite detention policies in the federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court and representation of human trafficking survivors. Before joining the Stanford Law School faculty in 2004, Professor Srikantiah was the associate legal director of the ACLU of Northern California and a staff attorney at the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project.

Alan O. Sykes

A leading expert on the application of economics to legal problems, Sykes has focused his research on international economic relations. His writing and teaching have encompassed international trade, torts, contracts, insurance, antitrust, and economic analysis of law. He has been a member of the executive committee and the board of the American Law and Economics Association, and currently serves as reporter for the American Law Institute Project on Principles of Trade Law: The World Trade Organization. Sykes is associate editor of the Journal of International Economic Law, and a member of the board of editors of the World Trade Review.

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.