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Alumni Bios

USC Gould School of Law

THREE HIGH-CALIBER SCHOLARS MEET DEMANDS OF NEW ERA

From USC Law Magazine, Fall/Winter 2017

When Dean Andrew Guzman took the helm at USC Gould in 2015, his main goal was to hire seasoned and innovative scholars to strengthen the faculty in evolving areas of the law.

Two years later, Guzman is well on his way.

Three prominent faculty are joining the ranks this academic year, including Orin Kerr, a nationally recognized authority on cybersecurity; Franita Tolson, an award-winning voting rights expert; and Michael Simkovic, a leading voice on the law of credit markets, corporate finance and the value of a legal education.

"Their scholarship is of the highest caliber and will complement the work of our existing faculty," says Guzman. "All three are incredibly strong additions to USC Gould."

NAVIGATING THE UNEXPLORED

Orin Kerr

Prof. Orin Kerr grapples with what the new world of criminal law will look like

Orin Kerr was a junior lawyer at the U.S. Department of Justice when an assignment that no one else wanted — writing a manual on the investigation of computer crimes — catapulted him into a strange new world.

Kerr knew no more about computer technology than the average PC user at the time — the year was 1998 — but he dug in, taking a look at the issues that came long before the birth of YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and Napster.

Prof. Kerr's work has been cited in more than 280 judicial opinions and 2,800 articles.

"It was the most important assignment of my career," says Kerr, who earned his master's degree in mechanical engineering from Stanford University before attending Harvard Law School.

The questions Kerr began researching two decades ago continue to be the focus of his scholarship. "Computers and the Internet are transforming criminal law, and my work grapples with what that new world should look like," he says. "It's a fascinating intellectual question that is also really important."

And others have taken notice of Kerr's answers. Although he only started teaching in 2001, his work has already been cited in more than 280 judicial opinions and 2,800 articles. According to a recent ranking, he is currently the most-cited law professor in the field of criminal law and procedure. A listing of the most influential law professors in the world by the legal publisher HeinOnline ranks Kerr at No. 24.

In January, Kerr will join USC Gould after 16 years at George Washington Law School in Washington, D.C. "Orin has spent years solidly earning a spot as a top criminal law and criminal procedure professor," says Dean Andrew Guzman. "Our faculty and students will greatly benefit from Orin joining our intellectual community."

Kerr is also a gifted litigator. He has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court and three federal circuits. He typically represents underdog clients in computer crime cases pro bono, such as a defendant sued by Facebook, MySpace "cyberbully" Lori Drew and Andrew "Weev" Auernheimer, a hacker sentenced to more than three years for collecting data from an AT&T website to expose its security vulnerabilities. Kerr successfully represented Auernheimer in his appeal, which was closely watched by cyber law and civil liberties advocates.

Although it's becoming increasingly rare for scholars to practice law, Kerr says that taking on cases helps his academic work. "It's one thing to theorize about what the law should be. But when you're writing a brief, you have to grapple with how far judges can go and how they might get there," he says.

Kerr also sees influencing the courts as a key part of his scholarly agenda. "Judges realize that the Internet is changing the law, and they want to know what the issues are and what the choices are," Kerr says. "One of the goals of my work is to help them."

Judicial opinions often cite Kerr's work, and at times debate what Kerr thinks. In a recent Fourth Amendment decision by the en banc Second Circuit, United States v. Ganias, the majority and dissent argued over whether Kerr had agreed with the panel opinion that the en banc court overturned. In his free time, Kerr writes for "The Volokh Conspiracy" blog and is highly active on Twitter, with more than 24,000 followers. "I used to blog too much. Now I blog less, but tweet more. It's like the heroin addict who switches to methadone. It's not much of an improvement."

But whether he tweets or blogs, the end goal is teaching the public about his emerging field and the issues at stake, and reaching as many different audiences as possible.

ORIN KERR ANSWERS FOUR QUESTIONS

What are you looking forward to doing for fun in Los Angeles?
Writing law review articles

What is your favorite Los Angeles-based movie/fiction/song?
"Relaxin' at Camarillo" by Charlie Parker

What do you like most about Los Angeles?
Traffic

What is the last book you read for pleasure?
Arthur Cornelius, "Search and Seizure" (1st ed. 1926)

Kerr is happiest in the classroom, and he looks forward to teaching a large criminal procedure class at USC in the spring. He uses a modified Socratic method of teaching, and he won the teaching award at his former institution.

"I love the interaction and exploring ideas and breaking down hard questions and seeing the assumptions that they rest on," he says about his teaching style. "I like to explore what is clear and then delve into what's unclear. When you do that, you can really develop a sense of what the law is."

LEADING ELECTION LAW EXPERT HOPES TO SPARK DIALOGUE

Prof. Franita Tolson raises questions that aren't being asked

When Franita Tolson took Barack Obama's constitutional law class at the University of Chicago Law School in 2003, little did she know that a decade later she would be a top election scholar analyzing some of the biggest legal decisions of her former professor's presidency.

"He was a fascinating professor," Tolson says. "A lot of the questions posed in class implicated issues that I would later write about in my scholarship. But if you told me that back then, I would've been very surprised."

As one of the nation's leading election law experts, Tolson's goal is to examine how history-shaping decisions are made in such power centers as the U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Congress, state governments and the White House.

Tolson's groundbreaking work centers on some of the heady issues often at the top of the daily news feed: voting rights, federalism, and constitutional legal battles.

"When I launch a new project, the first question I ask is ‘Who has the power to regulate?'" says Tolson. Take the 2000 presidential election contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore — and its surprising end in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Prof. Tolson's groundbreaking work centers on heady issues often at the top of the daily news feed: voting rights, federalism and constitutional legal battles.

"The Supreme Court stopped the recount and effectively decided the next president by applying federal constitutional standards to a question that was — fundamentally — one of state law: Are the ballots valid?"

Tolson writes with an eye toward developing something novel and, ultimately, useful. "I ask a lot of questions and hope to spark dialogue," she says, adding that it wasn't until Obama won his first term in 2008 that she decided to focus on election law.

"I've always been interested in topics affecting historically disenfranchised people — I started with employment discrimination law early in my scholarship and then moved to elections," Tolson says. "I realized that there are a lot of questions that are not being asked in election law."

Franita Tolson

Tolson, who joined USC Gould in June after eight years at Florida State University, will teach Election Law and Constitutional Law. She brings her questioning spirit into the classroom. She values dialogue with her students and hopes she can guide them, just as her law professors helped her. "I'm all about the classroom discussions," she says. "I like to challenge my students, and I also like to be challenged by them. I feel like I learn something new every time I teach a class."

Tolson stays in contact with early mentors, relying on them for feedback on her scholarship. One of her longtime supporters — and quite possibly the reason she is a law professor — is Professor Lisa Bernstein of the University of Chicago Law School.

"In my second year of law school, Lisa asked if I ever considered being a law professor, and I said no, thinking, ‘Do you see many law professors walking around here who are people of color? Only Barack Obama and Tracey Meares fit that description.'"

Even so, at Bernstein's urging, Tolson enrolled in a yearlong workshop specifically designed to prepare law students for the academic job market. The class taught how to write an article, give talks and think like an academic. "I did not go to Chicago with the goal of becoming a law professor," Tolson says. "But Lisa really gave me confidence. She became my mentor."

Bernstein says she knew Tolson was born to be a professor. "Every idea I put forth, she thought through from first principles and challenged accordingly," Bernstein says. "She accepted nothing at face value, no matter how famous the judge or academic who said it. It was clear that she had the questioning mind, the presence and ability to present ideas clearly and the innate fire in the belly to get things right that would make a first-rate academic."

Bernstein had so much faith in Tolson, she recommended her for the legal teaching position at Florida State.

Tolson is currently writing a book for Cambridge University Press, titled A Promise Unfulfilled: Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Future of the Right to Vote. "Legal scholars and courts have mostly ignored Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment," she says. "If a state takes away a person's right to vote, this amendment allows Congress to reduce a state's delegation in the House of Representatives. My book argues that Section 2 has contemporary implications for protecting the right to vote."

FRANITA TOLSON ANSWERS FIVE QUESTIONS

What are you looking forward to doing for fun in Los Angeles?
Theme parks!

What is your favorite Los Angeles-based movie?
"Beverly Hills Cop" because 1980s Eddie Murphy was everything.

What is your favorite quote?
"If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude." — Maya Angelou

What do you like most about Los Angeles?
I like that people are friendly and enjoy the outdoors.

What is the last book you read for pleasure?
"The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson

Tolson has a reputation for looking at history and current events with an unconventional and critical eye, says Prof. Rebecca Brown, a nationally recognized constitutional law theorist at USC Gould.

"Franita has distinguished herself by developing a creative historical analysis that has big implications for the right to vote today," she says.

Tolson grew up in a Chicago suburb. Her mother worked for Illinois Bell, and her father owned a trucking company. She has two older sisters who, along with her parents, emphasized the importance of education. "One of my sisters is a doctor, and the other is a dean at a college and owns a real estate company. Education was not optional in my household," she says.

After high school, Tolson attended Truman State University, a small liberal arts college in Kirksville, Mo. Tolson notes, "I was one of the few people of color, which was hard, but I loved it. It was the perfect school for me because it taught me how to think and thrive in a challenging environment, which prepared me well for law school."

Tolson voted for the first time in the election of 2000, which also would be a precursor to her scholarship. "I remember being so outraged and disheartened," she says.

"However, once I started studying politics from an academic standpoint, my entire view shifted. I was still upset, but I realized that there is more at stake than partisan politics. The legitimacy of our entire system of government depends on broad participation from the masses. Had every legitimate voter been able to cast a ballot in 2000, it is likely that the election wouldn't have been as close or as contentious. Through my scholarship, I want to do everything that I can to make universal suffrage as much of a reality as possible."

LIFELONG LOVE OF LEARNING

Prof. Michael Simkovic studies neuroscience, economics and film before becoming a leading (and provocative) legal scholar

Michael Simkovic has always been an out-of-the box thinker.

Michael Simkovic

That might explain his effectiveness in tackling politically charged scholarly issues ranging from student loans to the value of a law degree. Or how he once went to film school to study screenwriting. Or what led him to develop a deep appreciation for economics after teaching English in China as an undergraduate college student.

Simkovic, who joined USC Gould in June, is one of the nation's leading experts in commercial law and finance, with an emphasis on credit markets, financial regulation and taxation.

His scholarly endeavors often spark passionate discussion inside and outside the legal academy. For example, his study "The Economic Value of a Law Degree" was highlighted in dozens of publications, including The New York Times and The Washington Post, and across the blogosphere.

His finding that a law degree is worth $1 million in present value over a lifetime triggered heated debate, and even landed him a spot — four years in a row — on The National Jurist's Most Influential People in Legal Education along with Erwin Chemerinsky and Brian Leiter.

"The experience drove home for me the importance of a data-driven, empirical approach to understanding the world," Simkovic says. "In my view, our commitment to supplying unbiased, accurate, rigorous research to the public is among the most important reasons that universities exist."

For four years in a row, Prof. Simkovic was voted among the most influential in legal education by National Jurist Magazine.

USC Gould Prof. Robert Rasmussen, one of the nation's top bankruptcy experts, says Simkovic has already distinguished himself as one of the leading scholars of his generation. "Mike sets the terms of debate in fields such as the funding and value of higher education that involve the intersection of law and finance. We are very fortunate to have him as part of our law school community," Rasmussen says.

A neuroscience major as an undergraduate at Duke University, Simkovic's interest in economics was sparked on a summer trip to China where he taught English. His students were eager to understand what makes the U.S. economy successful — and Simkovic started asking himself the same question, which would be a precursor to later research.

But first he tried something completely different — he enrolled as a graduate student at USC's School of Cinematic Arts, studying screenwriting and sketch comedy. He learned about the structure behind effective storytelling and visual language. But after a year, he realized it wasn't the right career for him and dropped out.

"I was at a crossroads," Simkovic says. "I took a job as a paralegal to figure out my next step and discovered law was fascinating, and even better, I could combine it with my love for economics."

Simkovic enrolled at Harvard Law School, where he conducted empirical research on open market stock repurchases. After graduating, he took a job at McKinsey & Company, one of the world's most prestigious international management consultancy firms.

MICHAEL SIMKOVIC ANSWERS FIVE QUESTIONS

What are you looking forward to doing for fun in Los Angeles?
Bike riding along the beach

What is your favorite Los Angeles-based movie/fiction/song
"La Land"

What is your favorite quote?
"If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter."

What do you like most about Los Angeles?
The produce

What is the last book you read for pleasure?
Ted Chiang, "The Lifecycle of Software Objects"

He worked as a consultant for financial institutions in New York, analyzing the legal, regulatory, and business issues that affected these firms. In his second year at McKinsey, he took an unconventional turn by writing a paper analyzing the impact on the credit card industry regarding changes to the bankruptcy code that made it more difficult for borrowers to obtain debt relief.

One of his former professors sent the paper to Gretchen Morgenson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist with The New York Times, who wrote a front page story on the topic.

His research was also cited in a U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee report that recommended sweeping reforms of the credit card industry, which were included in legislation enacted in 2009. It was later cited by researchers at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the Government Accountability Office.

His paper also caught the eye of the dean of Seton Hall University School of Law who invited him to apply for a job. Simkovic had recently joined Davis, Polk & Wardwell, but says he couldn't pass up the chance to enter academia, which was his ultimate goal.

Simkovic is clearly in his element as a teacher and a researcher. "I am very happy in the classroom," he says. "When interacting with students, there's an almost electric energy."

He is currently continuing his research on student loans, with special attention to the tension between public and private lenders.

In his free time, Simkovic, a native New Yorker, loves to take long bike rides along the coast of Santa Monica, where he lives. He enjoys exploring restaurants, museums and spending time with new colleagues and old friends.