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Faculty Scholarship and Activities

• Presented "Coping with Lasting Social Injustice" at an international conference in Puerto Rico on "Justice and Policing in Diverse Societies" sponsored by the John Jay College of Criminal Studies and many other universities
• Presented a state-wide web seminar on "The Benefits and Limitations of Apology" for Florida judges and mediators who address workers' compensation claims within the Office of Judges of Compensation Claims.
• New York Times, May 26, 2008
  Wrote a short letter to the editor that was published discussing the article "What to Say After a Medical Mistake", New York Times, 5/26/08, at A18.

Charles Collier
Professor; Affiliate Professor of Philosophy

• Published "Presidential Debates and Deliberative Democracy," 117 Yale L.J. Pocket Part 288 (2008)

Elizabeth Dale
Affiliate Associate Professor; Associate Professor of History

• Published "Employee Speech & Management Rights: A Counterintuitive Reading of Garcetti v. Ceballos," 29 Berkeley J. of Employment & Labor Law 175 (2008).
• Published "People v. Coughlin and Criticism of the Criminal Jury in Late Nineteenth-Century Chicago," 28 NIU L. Rev. 503 (2008) (symposium).

Jeffrey Davis
Professor; Gerald A. Sohn Scholar

• Published "Florida's Beefed-Up Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors as an Alternative to Bankruptcy," 19 U. Fla. J. L. & Pub. Pol. 17 (2008).

George R. "Bob" Dekle
Legal Skills Professor

• Tallahassee Democrat, Aug. 2, 2008
  Quoted in an article describing a grand jury report that indicted two drug dealers on first degree murder charges for the death of 23-year-old Rachel Hoffman, an FSU student serving as an informant for the Tallahassee Police Department in a narcotics bust. The grand jury "presentiment" also accused the Tallahassee Police Department and Drug Enforcement Administration of "negligent conduct" for their handling of the case leading up to Hoffman’s death. "It is not an unheard of situation when a grand jury would hear a case and then be critical of the way some public official conducted him or herself," said University of Florida law school professor George R. Dekle. He said the report holds moral, not legal force. "Because it says in a report people were negligent doesn't settle the issue for all time as a question of fact," he said. But, he added: "I sure would not want a grand jury to issue a report critical of me."
• Daytona Beach News-Journal, July 12, 2008
  Quoted in an article discussing a judge’s decision to override a jury's recommendation that a man should be put to death for killing a 39-year-old mother of three in 1997. Dekle said any one of a number of factors may have been on the judge's mind. In one apparently likely scenario, "he disagrees with the jury," Dekle said. "He doesn't feel the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigators. It's easy to sit in the coffee shop and say what you should have done…But when you're sitting in the shoes of that prosecutor, judge and jury, and you're making those awful decisions, the world looks totally different."
• St. Petersburg Times, June 20, 2008
  Quoted in an article discussing a previous case he was interviewed about in which a graduation party turned fatal when police entered and shot a young man. The shooting is still under investigation and it is unclear the circumstances in which the shooting occurred but police have not released information on whether fingerprints were found on the gun or gunshot residue was found on the young man’s hands. Dekle was quoted saying gunshot residue is not considered persuasive in criminal courts, compared with other evidence such as DNA.
• St. Petersburg Times, June 11, 2008
  Discussed the fatal shooting of a young boy by a police officer. There has been an inability to gather accurate information because friends and family of the boy are not speaking about the incident. Dekle, a former prosecutor, said it has always been difficult for police to get teenage witnesses to cooperate in investigations, calling it "par for the course." "When you're talking about teenagers, you're talking about kids," Dekle said. "When something bad happens, a kid doesn't want anybody to know."
• Miami Herald, June 3, 2008
  Quoted in an article discussing The Miami-Dade Public Defender's Office plans to begin turning away thousands of cases in the coming weeks, arguing it is so short-staffed and under funded that attorneys can't effectively cover their assigned cases. Legal experts disagreed on whether public defenders can refuse cases simply because his attorneys are overworked and Dekle said, "The first showdown you're looking at is between the public defenders and the judge and how quick they can get out of jail after the judge puts them in jail for not accepting cases. Refusing to accept appointments in that situation is basically refusing to perform his constitutional duty."
• AM850, May 20, 2008
  Quoted in a radio interview discussing Governor Charlie Crist setting the date for the execution of a convicted rapist and child killer through lethal injection. The decision for the scheduled July first execution of Mark Dean Schwab came after the Supreme Court cleared the use of lethal injection in a Kentucky Case. The use of lethal injection was previously deemed unconstitutional and considered cruel and unusual punishment. Dekle, said as long as this is not so, execution permission can be granted. Dekle said the decision will be cleared for the Florida procedure to take place. The ruling will more than likely cause the signing of additional death warrants across the state.
• Ocala Star Banner, May 16, 2008
  Quoted in an article about Andrew Allred’s decision to waive his right to a jury, so only a judge will decide his punishment for the murders of two women. Dekle, a former prosecutor in Lake City, said one reason Allred might want to waive a jury during his penalty phase is to avoid jury bias. "If there is a tremendous amount of pretrial publicity, [defendants] may feel that a judge would be less likely to be influenced by pretrial publicity than a jury," he said. As to Allred's request to not be present in court, Dekle said it could be one avenue to set Allred's case up for a possible appeal. "Some people want to trick the system and see if they could have something happen [in circuit court] that the appeals court won't like," he said.

Patricia E. Dilley
Professor

• Proposed "Restoring Old Age Income Security for Low Wage Workers," which won one of 12 Rockefeller Foundation Innovation Awards (up to $30,000 each) to Strengthen Social Security for Vulnerable Groups. Pat accepted her award at a luncheon in New York, and a synthesis of the final papers will be made available to policy makers, congressional staff, executive branch transition teams, and other stakeholder communities.

Nancy Dowd
Professor

• Participated on a panel on "Masculinities Theory and Legal Interpretation" at the SEALS meeting, July 27-August 2.

Mark Fenster
Professor of Law, UF Research Foundation Professor

• Associated Press, Aug. 13, 2008
  AP reported on conspiracy theories regarding government-involvement in the 2001 Anthrax attacks and the apparent suicide of Army research scientist Bruce Ivins, whom the FBI was prepared to prosecute for perpetrating the attacks. Mark Fenster, author of a book on conspiracy theories, said the anthrax case is perfect for conspiracy theorists because it is "as dangerous as it could possibly be, and also deeply mysterious." The Bush administration's penchant for secrecy doesn't help, nor does its intelligence failures on Iraq, he said.

Joseph Jackson
Legal Skills Professor; Associate Director, Center of Children and Families

• Gainesville Sun, April 28, 2008
  Extensively quoted throughout an article discussing the statistics on crimes involving the homeless that have been part of a debate over putting a one-stop homeless services center in a warehouse in Gainesville, Fla. Jackson discusses the number of violent crimes of the homeless is a misleading figure because "it includes incidents in which homeless individuals were victims or witnesses rather than perpetrators." The article also stated, "Jackson’s analysis also found flaws in the summary's claim there were 1,226 homeless felons identified by Gainesville police. The figure represents arrests and not the number of individuals — and lumps in crimes that are unlabeled in the statistics, but could be felonies or misdemeanors."
• WCJB-TV 20, July 29, 2008
  Interviewed by TV20 regarding the petition drive to repeal Gainesville’s transgender ordinance.

Michelle Jacobs
Professor

• Published UN Shadow Report (U.S. Human Rights Network Committee for the Elimination of Racial Diwscrimination, 2008) (contributing author).

Robert H. Jerry, II
Dean; Levin Mabie and Levin Professor

• Was appointed by then-Chief Justice Lewis to a term on the Florida Board of Bar Examiners Testing Commission (which makes recommendations to the Florida Board of Bar Examiners about what should be tested on the Florida Bar)
• Appointed to the "Responsibility Centered Management Committee" (a UF committee charged with exploring the feasibility of introducing an RCM budget model to UF)
• Reappointed to the Bar Admissions Committee of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar; and for his reappointment to the Finance Committee of the University of Florida Foundation.
• Participated on a panel titled "'Say Something New': New Insights Into and Scholarship About the Goals and Responsibilities of Legal Education" at the SEALS meeting, July 27-August 2.

Shani King
Assistant Professor; Associate Director, Center on Children and Families

• Presented "The Canon of international Adoption: An Argument for Changing the Way We Think About International Adoption," at the 2008 Joint Annual Meeting of the Law and Society Association and the Canadian Law and Society Association in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
• Presented "The Canon of International Adoption: An Argument for Changing the Way We Think About International Adoption," SEALS meeting, July 27-August 2 (as UF Law's "New Scholar" presenter).

Lyrissa Lidsky
Professor; UF Research Foundation Professor

• Durham in Wonderland Blog, July 31, 2008
  http://durhamwonderland.blogspot.com/2008/07/seals-panel.html Mentioned in this award-winning blog for her recent appearance on the SEALS (Southeastern Association of Law Schools) conference where she served as a panelist and discussed the influence the media had on the Duke Lacrosse rape case. She is cited in arguing that "it would have been hard for the media not to have taken account of what he said. But most journalists—at least early on—didn’t stop to consider the tremendous power of a prosecutor’s statement, especially in a national media firestorm. The lacrosse case provided an "irresistible story" for many in the media, because of its dualities (differing races, classes, genders, etc.)."
• Time Magazine, Aug. 6, 2008, "Who Can You Sue? Click Here"
  Beginning next month, anyone with access to the Internet should be able to log onto WhoCanISue.com. The new Web site plans to help consumers determine whether they actually have a case and help them find an attorney from a list of lawyers who advertise their expertise on the Web site. The attorneys will pay an annual fee of $1,000 to appear on the site. University of Florida law professor Lyrissa Lidsky believes the service "is likely to increase the number of lawsuits." But, adds Lidsky, who specializes in Internet law and the First Amendment, "It's a good thing to the extent people are vindicating their legal rights to the extent they didn't years ago."
• The Independent Florida Alligator, Aug. 7, 2008
  After about a dozen students came to him and complained about the site, JuicyCampus.com — which allows people to anonymously post gossip about others — Student Body President Kevin Reilly sent a letter in June to Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum, urging him to investigate the site. The letter, also signed by Marc Hoit, UF’s former chief information officer, states that the site plays host to cyberbullying and raises concerns about public welfare and safety. Amid calls to shut the site down, free speech advocates have come to its defense. Lyrissa Lidsky, a UF law professor, said there is little the attorneys general can do about the site. They get involved because "it’s a great public relations move" for them, Lidsky said. Despite sometimes racy content, Juicy Campus is protected by a federal law that prevents Web sites from being held liable for content posted by others, she said.

Charlene Luke
Assistant Professor

• Published "Risk, Return, and Objective Economic Substance," 27 Va. Tax Rev. 783 (2008).

Pedro Malavet
Professor

• Published "The Story of Downes v. Bidwell: 'The Constitution Follows the Flag ... But Doesn't Quite Catch Up With It,'" in Race and the Law Stories (Rachel Moran and Devon Carbado, eds.) (Foundation Press, 2008).

Amy Mashburn
Professor

• Published "Can Xenophon Save the Socratic Method?" 30 Thomas Jefferson L. Rev. 597 (2008).

Diane Mazur
Professor

• USA Today, July 3, 2008, "In This War, Troops Get a Rousing Welcome Home."
  She commented on the relationship between increasingly elaborate celebrations for returning troops and the absence of a military draft: "What motivates these ostentatious displays is the unspoken, almost unconscious guilt over the way military service works now. A narrow slice of Americans serve again and again. It's as if we're saying, 'We will engage in these very public displays of worship, provided you don't ask us to serve.' "

Timothy McLendon
Visiting Assistant in Law; Staff Attorney

• Sun-Sentinel & Orlando Sentinel, July 3, 2008 & July 4, 2008
  Quoted numerous times about the ongoing legal suit between Marc Rubio and Gov. Charlie Crist. McLendon, who represented House Speaker Marco, said the case was not designed to stop the gambling, only to address whether Crist had the authority to enter into the compact without legislative approval. "There is probably going to be other litigation, the mechanism of how to make them stop," McLendon said. "The enforcement issue is a much trickier issue." McLendon said he doubts the Seminoles will voluntarily shut down their new games. He was further quoted in a similar article stating that his petition did not ask the justices to close the tribe's blackjack tables. How that will happen — or if it will happen — remains unclear, he said. "There is probably going to be other litigation ... You do get to that practical question of, 'how do you stop it?'" McLendon said. "That may require the use of the U.S. Attorney" to enforce the court's ruling.
• Quoted in an Everglades article discussing the growing desire to develop the area with condos and chain stores and those who are opposed to doing so. "It would be great if Everglades City offers another way that some of these conflicts can be mediated and people can get some common ground," McLendon said. "Because, in the end, even people who move to those places don't want to destroy them completely."

Marty McMahon
Clarence J. TeSelle Professor

• Published "Comparing the Application of Judicial Interpretative Doctrines to Revenue Statutes on Opposite Sides of the Pond," J.A. Jones, Harris & Oliver, eds., "Comparative Perspectives on Revenue Law" (Cambridge University Press, 2008)
• Published "Federal Income Taxation of Individuals" (with Bittker and Zelenak) (Thomson, 3rd edition, 2008 Cumulative Supplement No. 2)
• Published "Recent Developments in Federal Taxation: The Year 2007" (with Shepard and Simmons), in 8 Florida Tax Review 718-881 (2008).

Jon Mills
Professor; Director of Center for Governmental Responsibility; Dean Emeritus

• Published Privacy: The Lost Rights (Oxford University Press, 2008).
• St. Petersburg Times, June 27, 2008
  Quoted in an article referencing NRA attorney Chris Kise who said the U.S. Supreme Court decision which allows individual gun rights bolsters their case that lawmakers knew what they were doing when they passed a law protecting employees' and customers' rights to keep guns for self-defense in their cars, no matter where the cars are parked. Mills was in agreeance and stated, "It does have an effect, and it will be on people's minds from now on."
• WMNF 88.5 FM Community Radio, July 3, 2008
  Interviewed about the recent decision by the Florida Supreme Court who ruled against Gov. Charlie Crist in the Seminole gaming contract, saying he had no authority "to change or amend state law." Mills, who is House Speaker Marco Rubio’s legal advisor, is a gambling opponent who has consistently said that any compact is subject to state lawmaker’s approval.

Lars Noah
Professor

• St. Petersburg Times, June 14, 2008
  Extensively quoted in this article which discusses a pending lawsuit from a woman whose husband choked and died while eating dinner at a family friend’s house. Noah said, a person's moral obligations are not the same as his legal ones. If someone is in trouble, and you did nothing to harm them, then the law says you don't have to do anything to help them. Noah then says, "It may be crass, it may be conduct we would all frown upon, but you don't have to lift a finger." Otherwise, Noah said, everyone would be obliged to help — and be second-guessed by the law. "You would have this constant meddling," he said, "these do-gooders getting in your way." When Noah was asked about suing for not helping he replied "That's why it's rare. Lawyers don't bring those cases because they know from first-year torts, those never work, unless you can find some other angle." Furthermore, Noah said he sees the lawyers argument as half full in this particular case. “You ask 50 people on the street and I'm sure the vast majority would say sure, a reasonable person would do that," Noah said, referring to the Heimlich. "But as a matter of tort law, you don't have an obligation to act reasonably in the first place."

William Page
Senior Associate Dean for Academic Affairs; Marshall M. Criser Eminent Scholar in Electronic Communications and Administrative Law; Professor

• Presented "Measuring Compliance with Compulsory Licensing Remedies in the American Microsoft Case" at the ABA Antitrust Section conference on Remedies for Dominant Firm Misconduct, June 5 (with Danny Sokol as commenter)
• Published "Bargaining in the Shadow of the European Microsoft Decision: The Microsoft-Samba Protocol License" (with Seldon J. Childers), 102 Nw. U. L. Rev. Colloquy 332 (2008) http://colloquy.law.northwestern.edu/main/2008/06/bargaining-in-t.html
• Presented a paper (co-authored with Jeff Childers) about the enforcement of the American Microsoft judgments at the Remedies for Dominant Firm Misconduct Symposium at the University of Virginia on June 5.
• San Jose Valley Mercury News, Aug. 3, 2008
  Courts have differed on what constitutes anti-competitive behavior, according to legal experts interviewed by the Mercury News. But a company generally is considered to have abused its market dominance if its behavior hurts consumers, according to William Page, a senior associate dean at the University of Florida's Levin College of Law. (Speaking on an anti trust lawsuit filed by Advanced Micro Devices against computer chip giant Intel.

Juan Perea
Cone Wagner Nugent Johnson, Hazouri and Roth Professor

• Published Latinos and the Law (Thomson/West 2008)(with Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic).

John Plummer
Assistant Dean, Administrative Affairs

• Participated on a panel titled "Dealing with Difficult Economic Times" at the SEALS meeting, July 27-August 2. John also helped organize and run the conference, providing support for the Executive Director and the President.

Leonard Riskin
Chesterfield Smith Professor

• Published "Is that All there Is?: 'The Problem' in Court-Oriented Mediation" (with Nancy A. Welsh), 15 George Mason L. Rev. 863-932 (2008).
• Presented on mediation and mindfulness at the University of Gothenberg and the Lulea Technological University in Sweden
• Presented the keynote address and workshop on mindfulness at New Jersey ADR Day, sponsored by the N.J. Institute for Continuing Legal Education
• Presented a workshop on mindfulness for conflict resolvers at Pepperidge University Institute for Dispute Resolution (co-led with Rachel Wohl)
• Presented at the Negotiation Institute at Northwestern University School of Continuing Studies (co-led with Daniel Shapiro).

Thomas Ruppert
Assistant in Environmental Law

• Published "Eroding Long-Term Prospects for Florida’s Beaches: Florida’s Coastal Construction Control Line," 1 Sea Grant L. & Pol'y J. 65 (2008).

Michael Seigel
Professor

• South Florida Sun-Sentinel, June 8, 2008
  Discussed the recent actions of the Seminole Tribe of Florida's governing board and a friend who each acquired land from the tribe in rural Hendry County and then sold it for millions more in as little as six days. Tribal Council member David Cypress acquired 534 acres from the tribe in a deal that he voted in favor of when it came before the 5-member council and then sold the land in February for a gain of $4.5 million. "This guy is voting on the sale of land to himself," Seigel said. "It sounds to me like a classic case of self-dealing in which for whatever reasons the members of the Tribal Council ... set up these transactions simply to line the pockets of him and his buddy."
• AM850, April 23, 2008
  As a serving member of The Committee on a Civil, Safe and Open Environment, Seigel was interviewed about the recent recommendations for a restricted taser use on campus and also discussed committee recommendations that the university develop a Web site focusing on the education of free speech. Seigel is quoted saying “these changes were desperately needed.”

Michael Siebecker
Associate Professor

• Lectured on "Legal Ethics and International Corporate Social Responsibility" at the University of Costa Rica School of Law.
• Presented "Trust and Disclosure" at Monash University Centre, Italy.
• Presented "Trust, Efficiency, and Corporate Transparency," at Cambridge University, United Kingdom.
• In August, his latest article in three-part series on corporate speech, "Building a 'New Institutional Approach to Corporate Speech" 59 ALABAMA LAW REVIEW 247 (2008) (lead article), was selected for reprinting in THE FIRST AMENDMENT HANDBOOK 2008-2009. The Handbook, edited by Dean Rodney Smolla of the Washington & Lee University Law School, is a compendium containing a small handful of the "most notable articles on the First Amendment published in the prior year."

D. Daniel Sokol
Assistant Professor

• New York Times, July 30, 2008
  Interviewed for the front-page New York time article which explored Barack Obama as a law professor at the University of Chicago Law School, where Sokol was one of his students. Sokol said in describing Obama’s class, “For people who thought they were getting a doctrinal, rah-rah experience, it wasn’t that kind of class.”

Steven J. Willis
Professor; Associate Director, Center on Children and Families

• The Independent Florida Alligator, July 31, 2008
  Profiled for his recent submission for a position on the Florida Supreme Court. Willis was one of 49 other applicants vying for a seat on the court and said he would plan to keep his UF position because he will only be in Tallahassee for about a week each month and every Wednesday. In the interview Willis said he imagines that being a justice isn’t much different than being a professor — a lot of reading, a lot of deciding and a lot of writing. “A judge has to look at cases reasonably and fairly, and that’s what a law professor does,” he said. “I don’t argue a case; I present both sides.”

Michael Allan Wolf
Richard E. Nelson Chair in Local Government Law; Professor

• Published The Zoning of America: Euclid v. Ambler (University Press of Kansas, 2008).

Barbara Bennett Woodhouse
David H. Levin Chair in Family Law; Professor; Director, Center on Children and Families and Family Law Certificate Program; Co-Director, Institute for Child and Adolescent Research and Evaluation (ICARE)

• Published HIDDEN IN PLAIN SIGHT: The Tragedy of Children’s Rights from Ben Franklin to Lionel Tate on April 23, 2008.
• Vero Beach Press Journal, June 12, 2008
  Quoted in an article about a potential lawsuit over whether a 5-year-old's rights were violated when he was voted out of his kindergarten class for being autistic. Woodhouse said from a human rights perspective, the child's rights might have been violated, based on what she has heard of the case. The fact Alex was in the process of being tested for Asperger's syndrome, a type of high-functioning autism, moves the case closer to something that " 'shocks the conscience' as opposed to poor judgment or insensitivity on the part of the teacher," she said. "A teacher who invites a group of peers to critique the behavior of a child who is suspected of having a behavioral disorder and then has them vote to banish him from the class seems to have sufficiently breached the norms of good teaching that she and the school should be called to account in a court of law, if necessary," Woodhouse said in an email.

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