News Center

This Week's Experts – December 11, 2007

Overview

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

Topics

  • Drug Sentencing
    • Supreme Court Rulings: Kimbrough v. U.S., Gall v. U.S.
    • U.S. Sentencing Commission Votes to Ease Crack Sentences
  • CIA Tapes
  • Guantanamo
  • Global Climate Talks
  • Mortgage Crisis / Treasury Subprime Plan
  • New Jersey to Repeal Death Penalty
  • Barry Bonds
  • US Business
    • Facebook Privacy Concerns
    • Shareholder Lawsuits
    • Securities Fraud
    • Stock Option Backdating
    • Insider Trading
  • Product Liability Suits
  • Congress
    • Omnibus Spending Bill
    • Blackwater Probe / Contractors in Iraq
    • Energy Bill
  • Iran / NIE Report, UN Resolution
  • Russia / Presidential Succession
  • Israeli-Palestinian Talks
  • Pakistan

Topics

Drug Sentencing – Supreme Court Rulings: Kimbrough v. U.S., Gall v. U.S.

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

Drug Sentencing – U.S. Sentencing Commission Votes to Ease Crack Sentences

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

CIA Tapes

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

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

Global Climate Talks

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
David Victor
Professor of Law
650 724.1712
Expertise: Energy Law and Regulation, Environmental and Natural Resources Law, International Environment, International Law and Economy

Mortgage Crisis / Treasury Subprime Plan

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

New Jersey to Repeal Death Penalty

Robert Weisberg
Edwin E., Huddleson, Jr. Professor of Law
650 723.0612
Expertise: Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Criminal Procedure

Barry Bonds

William B. Gould IV
Charles A. Beardsley Professor of Law, Emeritus
650 723.2111
Expertise: Comparative Law, Labor and Employment Law, Sports and Entertainment Law (Bond's Legacy, Upcoming Mitchell Report)

U.S. Business – Facebook Privacy Concerns

Lauren Gelman
Executive Director, Center for Internet and Society
650 724.3358
Expertise: New Technologies and the Law, Law, Technology, and Privacy

U.S. Business – Shareholder Lawsuits

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 – Securities Fraud

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 – 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 – 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

U.S. Business – Product Liability Suits

Alan O. Sykes
Professor of Law
650 723.0178
Expertise: Corporate Law, Securities Regulation, Mergers and Acquisitions, Venture Capital

Congress – Omnibus Spending Bill

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

Congress – Blackwater Probe / Contractors in Iraq

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

Congress – Energy Bill

David Victor
Professor of Lawr
650 724.1712
Expertise: Energy Law and Regulation, Environmental and Natural Resources Law, International Environment, International Law and Economy

Iran / NIE Report, UN Resolution

Allen S. Weiner
Senior Lecturer in Law 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

Russia / Presidential Succession

Allen S. Weiner
Senior Lecturer in Law 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

Israeli-Palestinian Talks

Allen S. Weiner
Senior Lecturer in Law 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

Pakistan

Allen S. Weiner
Senior Lecturer in Law 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

Bios

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 an 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.

Lauren Gelman

In addition to heading up CIS's litigation and advocacy efforts around free speech, innovation, security, and privacy, Gelman teaches a course at Stanford Law School on Internet privacy. Her research focuses on the legal implications of technologies that increase citizens' opportunity to participate online. Gelman previously was associate director of CIS. Prior to joining Stanford, Gelman was corporate counsel for RealNames Corporation. She also spent six years in Washington, D.C. as the public policy director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and as the associate director of public policy for Association for Computing Machinery.

William B. Gould IV

A prolific scholar of labor and discrimination law, William B. Gould IV has been an influential voice on worker-management relations for over forty years and recently served as chairman of the National Labor Relations Board. Professor Gould has been a member of the National Academy of Arbitrators since 1970 and has arbitrated and mediated more than 200 labor disputes, including the 1992 and 1993 salary disputes between the Major League Baseball Players Association and the Major League Baseball Player Relations Committee. Professor Gould is the recipient of five honorary doctorates for his significant contributions in the fields of labor law and labor relations.

Henry T. "Hank" Greely

Greely directs both the Stanford Law School's Center for Law and the Biosciences and the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics' Program on Stem Cells in Society, and chairs the steering committee for the Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics. He chairs the California Advisory Committee on Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research and serves as an advisor on California, national, and international policy issues.

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.

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. She served as attorney of record for Center for Biological Diversity v. National Highway Traffic Administration, in which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Bush administration violated the law by ignoring global warming when it set national gas mileage standards for SUVs and pickup trucks.

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.

David Victor

David Victor, an expert in the areas of regulation, energy law, and environmental policy, came to Stanford University in 2001 to start the Program on Energy and Sustainable Development at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI). The Program focuses on the economic and environmental consequences of energy consumption, and much of Professor Victor's work involves extensive field research in emerging markets (notably China and India) and in some of the world's poorest regions, including in Africa. Professor Victor teaches regulation at the Law School and continues his work at FSI through a joint appointment. Previously, he directed the Science and Technology program at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

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.