2008 Roth Lecture

Judge Terry J. Hatter to speak on juvenile justice system

The Honorable Terry J. Hatter Jr., United States District Judge, will present the 2008 Justice Lester W. Roth Lecture at USC Law Oct. 27. The lecture will begin at 4 p.m. in Town and Gown on the University Park Campus, with a reception to follow.

Judge Terry J. Hatter Jr.

Judge Hatter will speak on “The Lack of Justice in the Juvenile Justice System.” Hatter presides over the Central District of California, the largest federal district court in the United States. He was appointed by President Jimmy Carter in 1979 as the first African-American to serve as chief judge of the Central District.

Prior to his appointment to the federal bench, Hatter sat on the California Superior Court for Los Angeles County and earlier was an assistant U.S. attorney for the Northern and Eastern Districts of California. He served as a special assistant and executive assistant to Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and has taught law at USC and Loyola Law School.

A Chicago native, Hatter graduated from Wesleyan University and received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1960, following his service in the Army and Air Force. He began his legal career as an assistant public defender and later went into private practice.

The Roth Lecture is presented at USC Law by a gift from the Louis and Florence Cohen Philanthropic Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles. The first Roth Lecture was presented in 1979. Recent Roth Lectures: The Hon. Michael W. McConnell   2007 Gov. George E. Pataki                 2005 Sen. Evan Bayh                           2005 Jeffrey Toobin, Legal Journalist   2001 The Hon. J. Harvie Wilkinson III  2000 The Hon. Rosemary Barkett        1999 The Hon. Anthony M. Kennedy    1998

Hatter has served as chair of the board of councilors at USC Law, and as chair of the board for the Los Angeles Civic Center Public Partnership. He currently serves on boards of the Rand Institute for Civil Justice and Equal Justice Works, and is vice chair of the Western Justice Center Foundation in Pasadena, Calif.

The Justice Lester W. Roth Lecture is named in honor of the former presiding justice of the California Court of Appeal, Second Appellate District. A 1916 graduate of USC Law, the late Justice Roth was appointed to the bench by Gov. Edmond G. Brown Sr. in 1963. He practiced law in L.A. and Beverly Hills and served as superior court judge and as vice president of Columbia Pictures Corporation. He died in 1992.

For more information, or to RSVP, please contact the USC Law Events Office.