WVU Law Class of 2023 graduates will spend their summers preparing
for the bar exam and then dive into new careers, which range from clerkships
with federal and state judges to positions in law firms and government agencies
all across the country. Here are a few of their stories:
Nakia Ridgeway
Ridgeway will begin a two-year clerkship with the Hon.
Michael J. Aloi, United States Magistrate
Judge for the Northern District of West Virginia, in Clarksburg.
She served as a judicial extern in Judge Aloi’s chambers during law school and
was eager to return to the “very hands-on opportunity.” While externing,
Ridgeway attended hearings, helped write orders, and even assisted in handling
two civil motions from start to finish.
Prominent trial attorney and West Virginia University College of Law
alumnus Paul Thomas Farrell, Jr. is the recipient of the 2023 College of Law Justitia
Officium Award. Established in 1978 to
mark the 100th anniversary of the College of Law, the Justitia Officium is the
highest honor bestowed by the law faculty in recognition of outstanding
contributions and service to the legal profession. Mr. Farrell received his award at Commencement
on May 12.
“Paul understands how lives hang in the balance when injustice
exists in our courtrooms and in our communities – and that, often, what can be
accomplished in the courtroom can change the lives of countless others outside
of it. Although he’s most recently fought
for justice from the opioid industry for the devastation it has caused
throughout West Virginia, Paul’s passionate advocacy for all and his relentless
dedication to the legal profession and its role in society have had an immeasurable
impact throughout his career. We are so honored that he and his wife, Jackie,
are our alumni and continue the Farrell family’s lasting legacy to the College
of Law,” said WVU College of Law Dean Amelia Smith Rinehart.
This spring, WVU Law students and members of the West Virginia
State Bar have been learning about international and domestic terrorism from former
international war crimes prosecutor Cody Corliss, a Wetzel County native who
returned to West Virginia to join the College of Law faculty last August.
Prior to coming to WVU Law, Professor Corliss served in the Office
of the Prosecutor at a United Nations criminal tribunal in The Hague, the Netherlands.
He was a member of the team that secured the conviction of
Bosnian Serb General Ratko Mladić on charges of genocide, crimes against
humanity and violations of the laws and customs of war.
Corliss spoke to judges and practicing lawyers at the West
Virginia State Bar 2023 Annual Meeting this spring and also taught a new law
school seminar focusing on terrorism.
“What’s nice for me is that my talk for the bar and my scholarship
dovetail really nicely with the seminar I’m teaching on domestic and
international terrorism,” said Corliss, who holds degrees from Harvard
University, Universiteit Leiden, and Cornell University. Fourteen students took
the introductory terrorism seminar.
Thirteen federal judges gathered with nearly 70 law students and
members of the state bar at WVU College of Law earlier this month for a
national diversity event designed to demystify the process of becoming a
bankruptcy or magistrate judge.
The purpose of the event,
according to co-chair Judge David Bissett, was to “put the bug in people’s ears
that lawyers from a variety of practice backgrounds” can become judges.
While WVU Law Director for
Career Services and Professional Development Lauren McCartney sees much to be
proud of in the College’s recently announced employment statistics for the
Class of 2022, the most exciting news is that 18 graduates secured
judicial clerkships at both the state and federal levels.
“We’re seeing a major trend with our
students wanting government service, and the judicial clerkship is an
opportunity for WVU Law students to get really hands on with work that
matters,” McCartney said. “A judicial clerkship is a great place to learn how
the court works and thinks.”
Six
of the 2022 WVU Law grads secured clerkships with federal judges, often besting
students from Ivy League institutions for these extremely prestigious and
sought out positions, McCartney said. Shawn Hogbin, a 2022 graduate originally
from Hedgesville, is working in Charleston for the Honorable
Irene C. Berger in the United States District Court for the Southern District
of West Virginia.
“Working
in chambers is truly a delight,” said Hogbin, 26, who will begin a second
clerkship in the fall with Judge Robert King in the Fourth Circuit Court of
Appeals. “I’ve heard people compare it to a small practice group. It feels very
close-knit, and we talk about all of the issues.”
Maggie
Lohmann, a third year WVU Law student from Bridgeport, has been named one of
the “finest law school writers” in the country by the Burton Awards, a national
non-profit program run in association with the Library of Congress and the
American Bar Association.
Lohmann, whose student law review note was chosen from
nominations submitted by the nation’s top law schools, will receive the “Law360
Distinguished Legal Writing Award” in Washington, D.C. The awards ceremony,
which will be held at the National Portrait Gallery in June, will be followed
by a gala reception and performance by comedian and late-night talk show host
Seth Meyers.
Lohmann’s winning piece, featured in the West Virginia
Law Review, examines
Federal Indian Law and land rights disparities. Lohmann said she wanted to
investigate the topic after reading a seminal case in Professor Alison Peck’s
property law class.
The White House Council on Environmental Quality recently announced
that WVU College of Law Professor Jesse Richardson has been appointed to a new task
force on responsible development of carbon management technologies. He will be
part of a group providing recommendations to the federal government on Carbon
Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration (CCUS) projects, including carbon
dioxide pipelines. Richardson and the task force will ensure that projects are
permitted efficiently and with the input of a wide range of stakeholders.
According to Richardson, CCUS projects capture carbon instead
of allowing it to be released into the atmosphere, potentially cutting
pollution.
“We’re trying to reduce carbon to the maximum extent
possible but when we can’t, let’s make lemonade out of lemons and see what we
can do to capture it and use it to minimize the environmental impact,”
Richardson said.
Ten
WVU Law Supreme Court Clinic students got to witness something last week that
many attorneys never experience over an entire legal career. These WVU Law students
were on hand at the United States Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. to watch an
oral argument that they assisted in preparing.
The students helped write several documents related to the case, including the
petition for certiorari. Lawrence Rosenberg of the international law firm Jones Day, who
co-teaches the clinic with WVU Law Professor Anne Lofaso, presented the oral argument. The case focused on
the interplay between two subsections of federal criminal law dealing with
firearm offenses. Lofaso sat at the counsel table with Rosenberg, and the
students sat a few rows back in an area of the courtroom typically reserved
only for members of the Supreme Court bar.
“They were so pumped afterwards,” Lofaso said, “They
were practically touching the justices.”
Lofaso said highly motivated students enroll in the year-long
clinic, which teaches advanced advocacy skills, including advanced legal
research. Students learn what makes a case a good candidate for Supreme Court
review.
It’s not every day that law students find
themselves arguing complex legal issues in front of actual Supreme Court
justices, but that’s exactly where WVU College of Law 2Ls Anna Williams and
Augustus Graff found themselves earlier this week.
The Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia
judged the West Virginia University College of Law’s Baker Cup Moot Court
appellate advocacy competition in the Supreme Court Courtroom in Charleston on March
28. The Court named Williams, 23, of Bluefield, the winner and Graff, 27, of
Ghent, the runner up. The Baker Cup, first
awarded in 1927, has become an annual College of Law tradition.
“This is not something that most law students would get to
experience,” said Amy Cyphert, moot court adviser and lecturer in law. “It’s a
unique opportunity because we’re the only law school in the state.”
