News

Professor Paula Johnson Featured on Frontline Episode on Wharlest Jackson Sr.

Paula Johnson

Syracuse, NY | February 4, 2022) Syracuse University College of Law Professor Paula Johnson will appear on an episode of Frontline entitled “American Reckoning” on February 15, 2022. The episode examines the unsolved 1960s bombing murder of NAACP and civil rights leader Wharlest Jackson Sr., offering rarely seen footage filmed more than 50 years ago.

“American Reckoning” examines Black opposition to racist violence in Mississippi, spotlighting a little-known armed resistance group called the Deacons for Defense and Justice, woven alongside the Jackson family’s decades-long search for justice amid the ongoing federal effort to investigate civil rights area cold cases. 

The episode airs at 10 p.m. EDT on February 15, 2022, on PBS and YouTube, and will be available for streaming. View the “American Reckoning” trailer, learn more about the program in this press release, and see further Frontline viewing options and information.

Johnson was tapped for the episode due to her work as Director of the Cold Case Justice Initiative (CCJI) at the College of Law and her ongoing work on the Wharlest Jackson case. CCJI conducts investigations and research on unresolved cases, offers academic courses, public forums, and other special events, and serves as a clearinghouse for sharing and receiving information on active cases. College of Law student members of CCJI were also interviewed for the episode. 

Johnson and CCJI students work with the Jackson family in sponsoring the Wharlest and Exerlena Jackson Legacy Project, which commemorates the legacies of Wharlest Jackson, Sr. and his wife Exerlena, and their contributions and ultimate sacrifices for racial justice, educational and employment opportunity, voting rights, and full participation in United States society.  The program includes speakers, and workshops for high school and junior high school students, parents, educators, and the public. The program will take place on April 1-2, 2022, on Zoom.  Further details will be available here.  Inquiries can be sent to The Jackson Legacy Project.   

Professors Mary Helen McNeal and Maria Brown Discuss Elder Abuse and Restorative Justice at Webinar

Mary Helen McNeal

Professor Mary Helen McNeal and Professor Maria Brown, assistant research professor at Syracuse University’s Falk College School of Social Work and the University’s Aging Studies Institute recently discussed their qualitative and academic research in the California Elder Justice Coalition webinar, “Syracuse, New York’s ‘Long Game’ for Adopting Restorative Approaches to Elder Abuse”.

They shared highlights from their Collaboration for Unprecedented Success and Excellence (CUSE) grant-funded international symposium on elder abuse and restorative justice.

The discussion also included Brown and McNeal’s work with local Syracuse-area service providers Vera House and the Center for Court Innovation, exploring the potential of restorative practices to intervene in elder-abuse situations, including the current “eCORE Project,” which offers community building and conflict resolution circles to seniors in Christopher Community Housing in Syracuse.

A recording of the webinar and a restorative justice toolkit are now available from the California Elder Justice Coalition (CEJC), which sponsored the webinar.

Read the Syracuse University News article.

Professor Nina Kohn Discusses Nursing Home Industry Regulatory Changes

Professor Nina Kohn

In the investigative article “Failure of Care” for NJ Advance Media/nj.com, Professor Nina Kohn discusses the regulatory changes needed to ensure that known bad actors aren’t allowed to operate nursing homes or access public funds—at the expense of residents and taxpayers.    

“If an owner of a nursing home has a history of operating other nursing homes in an inhumane or inhumane manner, or siphoning off funds needed for resident care, the federal government should not certify new homes that the owner buys for Medicaid and Medicare,” she said. “To put it bluntly: the taxpayers should not be signed up to pay owners who have a history of seriously failing to provide the type or quality of care that they are paid to provide.”

Similarly, in deciding what penalties to impose when nursing homes violate regulations designed to protect residents, Kohn believes regulators should not look at each nursing home separately.

“The fact that an owner has substantial deficiencies across numerous homes should, for example, lead to the government being less willing to waive monetary fines,” she said, adding that federal regulators generally do not consider the owner’s prior bad acts in connection with other facilities— or even their current bad acts in other facilities — when determining whether or not to certify a home for Medicare or Medicaid.

Read the full article. A subscription is Required.

Professor David Driesen Speaks with CNY Central on the New York State Mask Mandate for Schools

Professor David Driesen

University Professor David Driesen recently spoke with CNY Central on governmental power issues surrounding New York State’s mask mandate for schools. 

“It’s a debate we’ve had since the founding, about what is the appropriate scope of government power and how much power there should be,” said Driesen. “But the government always…any kind of law has an element of coercion to it, they’re not optional.”

View the news story here.

Professor Paula Johnson Discusses Race, Biases, and Criminal Law Issues in the Wrongful Conviction of Anthony Broadwater

Professor Paula Johnson

In the in-depth Syracuse Post-Standard article, “Alice Sebold case: How Race and Incompetence Doomed Anthony Broadwater to Prison”, Professor and Director of the Cold Case Justice Initiative Paula Johnson discusses racial, bias, and criminal law aspects of the case.

Professor Johnson states that “these outrages in the criminal justice system highlight biases that can distort fundamental American principles: ‘Whose life has value? Whose life does not have value? Who has credibility and who doesn’t? Who is prone to criminality, who is prone to victimization?’”

Professor Gregory Germain Weighs in on Two Credit Card Stories for MoneyGeek

Professor Gregory Germain

Commercial and bankruptcy law expert Professor Gregory Germain provides insight into low APR credit cards, noting “I think the Motown group The Miracles gave the best answer to this question: “My mama told me, you better shop around (shop, shop). Oh yeah, you better shop around.” This applies not just to credit card interest rates but all credit card terms, including cash back offers, annual fees and other charges and credit limits.” Read his full answer to What can people do to increase their odds of getting lower APRs on their credit cards?

Germain also answers the question, What are the possible advantages and disadvantages of adding authorized users to a primary credit card with regards to earning rewards? “When I teach commercial law, I tell my students that we have another name for someone who guarantees a debt for a friend or relative. We call the guarantor ‘a fool with a pen.’” Read his entire answer here.

Syracuse University College of Law taps Alumnus and Entrepreneur Luke Cooper L’01 as 2022 Commencement Speaker

Luke Cooper L’01

Syracuse University College of Law has announced that College of Law alumnus and Fixt Founder and corporate executive Luke Cooper L’01 will serve as its Commencement Speaker on May 6, 2022. Cooper is presently CEO of Latimer Ventures, a Partner at San Francisco-based Preface Ventures, and 2022 Visiting Scholar at the University of Maryland Baltimore, which encompasses Maryland’s Law School, Medical School, and other graduate programs.

“Luke has been a strategic planner, technology innovator, and product developer for more than 20 years,” says Dean Craig M. Boise. “We are honored to welcome him back to Syracuse University and look forward to hearing about his entrepreneurial successes and how his law degree from the College of Law and personal life experiences have shaped his leadership style and professional pursuits.”

In a 2020 Stories Book article, Cooper credits Syracuse Law with developing skills in critical thinking, analytical reasoning, and advocacy that have fueled his successes. Importantly, Cooper is passionate about building diverse and inclusive work cultures and lifting up Black entrepreneurs. 

Cooper, who built and sold his first cyber startup to CACI in 2011, founded the device support platform Fixt, which he sold to Assurant in 2020. He is only the second Black tech entrepreneur to see a company through to a successful exit in Baltimore, MD. He serves on the Board of Trustees of the University of Maryland Baltimore Foundation and has been appointed by Gov. Larry Hogan to serve on the Board of Directors of Maryland’s TEDCO. 

Cooper’s upcoming memoir—Mud to Magic: A Black Tech Entrepreneur’s Inspiring Journey (2022)—will tell his life story and share his powerful message, that showing up as your most authentic self will drive the best outcomes. 

Professor Shubha Ghosh Invited by the Japan Patent Office to Participate in Two Patent Workshops 

Professor Shubha Ghosh

Professor Shubha Ghosh, Director of the Syracuse Intellectual Property Law Institute, will participate in the workshop, “Research on Standard-Essential Patents and Patent Exhaustion”, being held January 31-February 1 by the Japan Patent Office.  Ghosh will provide legal insight and perspectives on these timely patent issues.

In the Standard-Essential Patents (SEP) workshop, the program will include a report on the latest global trends in SEPs and a panel discussion on standard essential patents from various perspectives, in addition to the interim report of the results.

In the Patent Exhaustion workshop, the program will include a lecture on the state of Patent Exhaustion in the age of IoT and a panel discussion on the utilization of method patents in the change in industrial structure from “things” to “services”, in addition to the interim report of the results.