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Professor Shubha Ghosh Receives a 2023-24 Wikimedia Race and Knowledge Equity Fellowship

Shubha Ghosh, Crandall Melvin Professor of Law and Director of the Syracuse Intellectual Property Law Institute, has been awarded a 2023-24 Wikimedia Race and Knowledge Equity (WRKE) Fellowship.

The WRKE Fellowship Program is a one-year fellowship designed to explore the intersection of racial equity, free knowledge, and the intellectual property ecosystem, and to promote sound policy for achieving social justice through these overlapping disciplines.

For his Fellowship grant, Ghosh plans to compile information about existing Intellectual Property (IP), Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM), and artistic educational programs, with the goal of creating a map of this landscape, along with an analysis of these programs.

“I selected this focus because educational programs in entrepreneurship and IP at the K-12 level exist but have been understudied. Universities are the major avenues for commercializing technology in conjunction with private industry and government research labs. But by the time students enter college, the issues surrounding entrepreneurship and innovation come across as unfamiliar,” says Ghosh.  “The development of entrepreneurship and IP education programs at the K-12 level was established to educate students about these issues earlier as they develop their own educational and career paths.  My goal is to work, within existing channels of research, to better understand what these programs involve and whether they can be improved.” 

Ghosh will disseminate his research through original writings in journals, book chapters, and law reviews. “My research will also connect me with policymakers at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office who have just started to study these issues in depth and with nonprofit organizations like The Henry Ford in Detroit, which works with the Ford Museum and the Ford Foundation, to design programs on entrepreneurship and intellectual property in the Detroit metro area. The Henry Ford is also designing a comprehensive database of these programs throughout the United States. I will be analyzing this database as well as contributing to it,” he says.

About the Fellowship

The role of the WRKE Fellow is to undertake scholarly and other research, produce scholarly publications and public intellectual writings intended to contribute to the body of free knowledge and racial equity scholarship, and to organize and present policy and community educational programming relevant to the Fellowship’s research and education agenda. The WRKE Fellow will work at the direction of supervising IIPSJ and HUSL personnel (in consultation with Wikimedia Foundation legal and policy staff), and receive support, guidance and mentorship from the WRKE Fellowship Advisory Board, made up of distinguished legal academics in the field of intellectual property social justice. Members of the Board are on hand to provide the Fellow with scholarly insight, policy expertise, and general guidance where needed to achieve Fellowship goals.

Among other things, the research and programming will examine the role of doctrinal elements within the IP law in contributing to traditions of systemic IP racial inequity and related injustice. The resulting research analyses will be put towards constructing free knowledge initiatives to improve the understanding and use of intellectual property in marginalized and underserved communities. The ultimate goal of the research is to improve racial equities through the IP ecosystem and related socio-economic aspects of the political economy, and will be available to the general public, IP law and policy makers, and IP practitioners.

The fellowship is funded through a grant from the Knowledge Equity Fund at the Wikimedia Foundation and is jointly administered by the Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ) and the Howard University School of Law (HUSL).

3Ls Tracy Acquan and Thomas Sheffield Named Feinman Fellows as Spring 2024 Externs

3Ls Tracy Acquan and Thomas Sheffield have been named Feinman Fellows for the Spring 2024 semester. Established by Martin Feinman ’73, G’77, L’83, the Feinman Fellows receive a financial gift to help defray expenses associated with taking on their Spring externships in recognition of their commitment and dedication to public service. Feinman is the Director of Juvenile Justice Training at the Legal Aid Society of New York City.

Both students are externing with the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the Northern District of New York. This public defender office in Syracuse, NY represents people charged with federal crimes who cannot afford to hire an attorney. It furthers the representation and rights of indigent persons in the criminal justice system by providing direct representation, training the broader federal defense bar (including attorneys assigned under the Criminal Justice Act), and tracking developments in federal criminal law.

Professor Roy Gutterman L’00 Reacts to Courts Ruling on Police Departments Releasing Officer Misconduct Reports

Professor Roy Gutterman L’00, Director of the Tully Center for Free Speech, Associate Professor at the Newhouse School, and Professor of Law at the College of Law, discussed two recent New York court decisions supporting Newsday’s requests for police department officer misconduct reports.

Gutterman noted that it is appropriate for agencies to redact personal, financial, and medical details, but “there is a vast disparity between an unsubstantiated report of police misconduct and legitimately private information.”

The article may require a subscription to Newsday.

Professor Shubha Ghosh Contributes Chapter on Intellectual Property in the Book Intellectual Property Rights in the Post Pandemic World

Crandall Melvin Professor of Law Shubha Ghosh, director of the Syracuse Intellectual Property Law Institute, has contributed a chapter on how economic rewards and property rights can shape invention and innovation in the new book INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS IN THE POST PANDEMIC WORLD, published in December by Edward Elgar Publishing.

In this new work of scholarship titled Crisis, Invention, and Innovation, Ghosh identifies a new impetus for innovation: crisis.  A crisis is an external challenge to society’s economic, social, and legal systems, such as a war or pandemic. Such a challenge stirs innovators and entrepreneurs to devise solutions to address the crisis. Professor Ghosh demonstrates how this theory of crisis and innovation can help to understand the development of the Polio vaccine, HIV vaccines, and Covid vaccines. 

Professor Gregory Germain Provides Expert Analysis at Law 360 on: What Happens If High Court Rejects Releases In Purdue Ch. 11

Professor Gregory Germain has contributed an expert analysis article to Law 360 on the Purdue Phrama Chapter 11 case that is now before the Supreme Court.

In “What Happens If High Court Rejects Releases In Purdue Ch. 11”, Germain examines the question: Do bankruptcy courts have the power to discharge or release claims held by non-debtor parties against other non-debtor parties, or is the power to discharge debts limited to claims against the bankrupt debtor?

He concludes, “If the Second Circuit upheld an opt-out plan, and the Supreme Court refused to hear the certiorari petition, the plan would be effective and binding. That strikes me as the most likely end to the case, as all of the active creditors support the deal, few of the little creditors will opt out, and even fewer, if any, will have the wherewithal to seriously threaten the Sacklers’ well-funded and well-planned defenses.”

“It’s a Disappointing Outcome”: Professor Kat Macfarlane on the Jury Decision in the Vivian Cheung Discrimination Case

Professor Kat Macfarlane, director of the Disability Law and Policy Program, spoke again with Science after the Maryland jury unanimously voted against disabled researcher Vivian Cheung’s discrimination case against Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

“It’s a disappointing outcome but I’m grateful to Viv for taking on this fight,” says Macfarlane. “Every time disability discrimination is challenged in this manner it helps the next person find the courage to speak up, too.” 

College of Law Adds Richard Wallach L’06 as a Visiting Professor

Richard Wallach L’06 has joined the College of Law as a Visiting Professor teaching Legal Communications and Research.

Prior to joining the College of Law, Wallach served as Career Law Clerk to the Honorable Kathleen Cardone of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas for nearly sixteen years, from 2006 to 2022. He supported Judge Cardone by drafting orders and memos and by providing counsel to the Judge on a wide variety of civil and criminal issues.  He also supervised the term law clerks in their work for the Court. After clerking, Wallach practiced immigration law in Syracuse, first at Hiscock Legal Aid Society and then as a solo practitioner.

Before his legal career, from 1991 to 2002, Wallach served in various management and marketing roles at FAME Information Services, a software company that developed analytical tools for economists and quantitative analysts in finance and government.

Wallach earned a J.D. summa cum laude in 2006 from Syracuse University College of Law, as well as an M.A. in East Asian Studies in 1988 from Yale University, and a B.A. in Economics in 1987 from Haverford College. In 1987, he attended The Stanford Center in Taipei, Taiwan, for intensive study of Mandarin Chinese.

While a student at the College of Law, he was the Managing Editor of Syracuse Law Review and was a member of the Order of the Coif and the Justinian Honor Society.

Professor Robert Nassau on Tax Settlements: “The (New York) State Wants to Be a Lot More Aggressive Than the Federal Government”

In a lengthy article on low-income tax debt contributed to USA Today by the Center for Public Integrity, Professor Robert Nassau weighs in on the difference between negotiating debt with the IRS versus New York state.

“The IRS is very reasonable at dealing with lower-income taxpayers who have tax debts,” says Nassau, director of the Sherman F. Levey 57, L’59 Low Income Taxpayer Clinic. “They’re very understanding of people’s circumstances. Compared to the IRS, the New York State Department of [Taxation and] Finance is the devil. The state wants to be a lot more aggressive than the federal government.”

“Very Rare”: Professor Robert Nassau on the Recent Hunter Biden Federal Criminal Tax Evasion Charges

Professor Robert Nassau, director of the Low Income Taxpayer Clinic, said the recent Federal criminal tax evasion charges brought against Hunter Biden are “very rare.”

In a BBC News article, Nassau notes that “the criminal statutes cited in this case are pretty broad and could apply to millions of people who don’t file a return for one reason or another… prisons could, theoretically, be overfilled with tax criminals.”