School Notes: Yale Law School
September/October 2008

Military justice expert appointed Rogatz Visiting Lecturer

Eugene R. Fidell, a leading expert in military justice and founding president of the National Institute of Military Justice in Washington, DC, will join Yale Law School in January 2009 as the Florence Rogatz Senior Visiting Lecturer in Law. Since 1984, he has been a partner at Feldesman Tucker Leifer Fidell LLP in Washington, DC, where he heads the firm's military practice group. Fidell has taught at Harvard Law School and American University's Washington College of Law and began teaching as a visiting lecturer in law at Yale Law School in 1993. As the Rogatz Senior Visiting Lecturer, he will continue to teach his popular course on military justice and do other lecturing and clinical teaching. He will also address military justice issues in collaboration with the National Institute of Military Justice.

YLS students helped prepare case detailed in Business Week

Yale Law School students played a key role in a lawsuit that is the subject of Business Week's June 5 cover story, "Banks vs. Consumers (Guess Who Wins?)." The lawsuit was filed by San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera on behalf of the People of the State of California against the National Arbitration Foundation (NAF) and one of its largest clients, FIA Card Services, Inc. It charges that NAF arbitrators unfairly favor creditors over consumers and that FIA misuses the unfair arbitral process created by NAF. Several Yale Law students helped research the many legal issues involved and helped prepare the case for litigation. The students began working with the city attorney's office in September 2006 through a unique partnership called the San Francisco Affirmative Litigation Project, which also includes students from Berkeley Law School. Yale Law professor Heather Gerken and visiting lecturer Kathleen Morris helped create Yale's program. "Since it began," said Gerken, "the Yale students have been involved in a number of significant public policy cases and gotten an insider's view of the cutting-edge public interest work being done in San Francisco."

Fellowship will support students in human rights

A $3 million gift from the Robina Foundation will fund the creation of the Robina Foundation Human Rights Fellowship Initiative at Yale Law School, which will provide support for human rights leaders at all stages of their careers. The initiative will meet the intense interest students have in human rights and their need for financial support to pursue human rights careers. It will also foster the work of human rights advocates by providing opportunities for them to spend time in residence at Yale Law School. Through the initiative, the Law School will make financial support available as student scholarships, summer human rights fellowships, postgraduate fellowships, and fellows-in-residence opportunities. "Investing in the development of human capital is a critical, but usually overlooked, step toward ensuring the successful future of the human rights movement worldwide," said Dean Harold Hongju Koh. "This initiative will seek to fill that gap by educating future leaders at all levels and fields of human rights work."