Professor Cheryl Bader was quoted in an Associated Press article that examines how the will that Jeffrey Epstein signed two days before his death could make it harder for his accusers to collect damages. By putting his fortune in a trust, he shrouded from public view the identities of the beneficiaries, whether they be individuals, organizations or other entities. For the women trying to collect from his estate, the first order of business will be persuading a judge to pierce that veil and release the details. From there, the women will have to follow the course they would have had to…
Author: Newsroom
In an article published in Route Fifty, Professor Deborah Denno responded to Ohio state Rep. Scott Wiggam introducing legislation that would allow the state to use seized fentanyl for executions. In response, state Rep. Scott Wiggam introduced legislation to allow the state to use seized fentanyl for executions. “My thought process is one, I know that fentanyl is a drug that can be used in executions—it was used in Nebraska. My other thought process is that I know that we have a lot of it. We’ve seized enough fentanyl or carfentanil in the state of Ohio to kill half the…
Founder and academic director of the Fashion Law Institute, Professor Susan Scafidi, was interviewed by COMPLEX about what it means to own a trademark but have no ownership in the business using that trademark. “Trademarks are the most valuable asset of any fashion company. Designers live and die, seasons come and go. Products come in and out of style, but the trademark is forever,” says Scafidi. “The trademark is where the value of a fashion company lies. So licensing a trademark to another company is a big deal.” Scafidi points to Donna Karan as a case study on what happens when…
Professor Nestor Davidson talked with USA Today about the impact of “preemption laws” on cities like Philadelphia and other municipalities that want to enact stricter gun control law than those adopted by their state. A Pennsylvania law bans local municipalities from enacting gun control measures that are more strict than those adopted by the state. Philadelphia politicians are far from alone. More than 40 states have passed similar so-called “preemption laws,” which have become a powerful tool of the National Rifle Association and other pro-gun groups looking to tamp down gun control efforts. … A similar battle is underway in…
Professor Lawrence Brennan provides insight to the Los Angeles Times on the logistics involved with the proposed U.S.-led naval mission being proposed by the Trump administration to protect shipping from Iranian attack. To protect shipping from Iranian attack, Washington has called on 60 countries to join a U.S.-led naval mission that would organize convoys to escort vessels as they pass through the Strait of Hormuz, which is considered the world’s most important oil transit choke point. Yet the challenges before such a mission are considerable, said Lawrence Brennan, a professor in maritime law at Fordham University and a former Navy…
Professor Cheryl Bader provided legal context to Fox news on how Jeffrey Epstein may have been able to exploit discrepancies in the National Sex Offender Registry. “Jeffrey was able to get around some of the registration requirements because he claimed his residence was in the Virgin Islands and his plea deal allowed him to take advantage of a loophole in New Mexico,” Cheryl Bader, a former federal prosecutor who teaches criminal law at Fordham Law School, told Fox News. “The national registry is a compilation of information, so its accuracy depends on how compliant each jurisdiction is with maintaining and…
Fordham Law is delighted to welcome 138 new graduate law students. These individuals include 120 new students in eight LL.M. degree program; 16 new students in the in-person M.S.L. programs; and two new doctoral degree candidates, both of whom received their LL.M. degrees from Fordham, and who will be working under the supervision of Professor Martin Flaherty and Professor Chi Mgbako. This new group of students joins the 58 LL.M., 26 M.S.L., and nine doctoral students who are continuing their studies for a total of 231 graduate students. This semester also marks the start of our online M.S.L. program in…
Professor Bruce Green was quoted in a Law360 article about the investigation into misconduct by the Kansas U.S. attorney’s office. A Kansas federal judge held the Kansas U.S. attorney’s office in contempt for obstructing an investigation into prosecutors’ practice of listening to calls between inmates and their defense attorneys, saying the conduct was driven by “dysfunction and strife” and the ruling could impact scores of criminal cases. In a sweeping 188-page order issued Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Julie Robinson said federal prosecutors in Kansas refused to cooperate with a special master’s three-year investigation and “easily” violated multiple court orders by…
Professor John Pfaff wrote an op-ed published in Politico Magazine in which he makes the case based on his research for the need to focus on crimes of violence, rather than drug offenses, to make meaningful progress in addressing justice reform and mass incarceration. Drug crime is not what’s driving the high prison population in the United States. It’s crimes of violence. And this omission has consequences. It means that any “solution” is unlikely to achieve its intended goal and in the meantime society will continue to suffer long-term damage—physical, psychological and economic—from a persistent cycle of unaddressed violent crime.…
Professor John Pfaff wrote an op-ed published in The Appeal about Attorney General William Barr’s opposition to reforms by progressive prosecutors. Barr’s speech was standard tough-on-crime fare: He argued that anything that scaled back mass incarceration would inevitably lead to more crime. It cannot be stressed enough that a wealth of data disproves that. Longer prison sentences provide little to no additional deterrence, often incapacitate beyond what public safety requires, and can actually increasethe risk of reoffending upon release. Rehabilitation efforts are consistently more effective outside prisons than inside them, and victims increasingly indicate that they prefer a focus on rehabilitation and reintegration instead of punitiveness.…