Symposia

Reinventing Juvenile Law: A New Construct for Practice and Policy

April 30-May 1, 2009

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Faculty

The Honorable Jay D. Blitzman, Juvenile Court Department, Middlesex Division, Lowell, Massachusetts. Judge Blitzman was appointed to the juvenile court bench in June of 1996. Prior to his appointment he was a founder and the first director of the Youth Advocacy Project (YAP), a community-based, interdisciplinary legal services organization in Roxbury, MA.. YAP is a 2008 MacArthur Foundation grant recipient. Judge Blitzman has served as member of the Supreme Judicial Court Study Committee on the Code of Judicial Conduct and is a member of Supreme Judicial Court Standing Committee on the Rules of Criminal Procedure. In 2000 he was appointed to the S.J.C. Committee on Judicial Ethics. He also has been appointed to the SJC Advisory Committee studying the scope of permissible judicial comment.

Since joining the bench, Judge Blitzman has continued to participate regularly in continuing judicial and legal education programs sponsored by MCLE, Suffolk Law School’s Juvenile Justice Center, and the Flaschner and Judicial Institutes. He has been active in professional and bar association activity and has presented at a variety of criminal and juvenile justice forums. He has served as the chair of the M.B.A.’s Juvenile Practice Committee as a member of the Criminal Justice Section and as a member of the MBA Individual Rights and Responsibilities Section and helped found the newly created Juvenile Justice and Child Welfare Section. Jay was also a member of the MBA sponsored Governor’s Task Force on the Unmet Needs of Children. Boston Bar Association (BBA) service has included committee representation on the BBA Juvenile Justice Task Force Study (1990-1992) and the BBA CHINS Truancy study group (1997-1999). The Juvenile Justice Task Force report was published in the New England Law School Journal on Criminal and Civil Confinement. He is currently a member of the BBA Access to Justice Committee. In 1994 he received the BBA John G. Brooks Public Service Award. In 2007 he received the Juvenile Bar Association Leo Lydon Award. CPCS awards a Jay D.Blitzman youth advocacy award annually. In 1999 he was named the state’s top juvenile court judge in a Lawyer’s Weekly poll.

Judge Blitzman writes frequently for MCLE publications ( e.g. “Juvenile Law Basics”, 1995-1999, “Delinquency Practice”, “Recent Developments in Juvenile Law”; prepared for the annual MBA conferences). He contributed to, and edited, Volume I of the Massachusetts Juvenile Court Bench Book Juvenile Court Bench Book ( MCLE 1998, 2000), prior to being named editor in chief of the latest edition which was published by MCLE in 2003; the next edition is scheduled for publication in 2009. Other publications include “Delinquency Procedure” (Chapter 49, Massachusetts Criminal Practice, Blumenson, Ed., Lexis, 1998, 2000, 2003), “The Theory and Scope of Juvenile Court” (a paper presented to the National Academy of Sciences, National Research Council, January 1999, Washington D.C.), “Gault’s Promise”; Barry Law Review 2008, and co-authored “Children’s Attorneys-Should They Be Advocates or Champions-The Role of Counsel For Children In Massachusetts”; (MSL, Winter 2004),.

Conference presentations include participation in the Department of Justice Department National Defender Conference debating the future of the juvenile court (Washington D.C., 2000), and keynotes for the annual Connecticut Juvenile Court Conference (Are We Re-criminalizing Status Based Conduct (2004), the annual Massachusetts school-law conference (School-Court Communication; MCLE 2008), and Moritz Law School (Ohio State University; Issues in Child Welfare Cases, and School-To-Prison Pipeline; 2008). In June of 2006 he testified before the Prison Rape Enforcement Act Commission (PREA) Presidential Commission chaired by Justice R. Walton on juvenile justice detention practices. His testimony before the Massachusetts Access to Justice Commission (Supreme Judicial Court committee) has become the subject of a law review article to be published in 2008 (Massachusetts Law Review). Judge Blitzman has also consulted with the Justice Department Bureau of Justice Assistance regarding the administration of technical grants and with the MacArthur Foundation Adolescent Resource Network project studying children in the legal system. Judge Blitzman has served as a clinical supervisor for Boston College and Harvard Law Schools and has supervised co-op students from Northeastern Law School as the Youth Advocacy Project’s first director, and in juvenile courts in Cambridge and Lowell since his appointment.. Since 1986, the judge has been a regular participant at Harvard Law School’s Trial Advocacy Workshop program. Since 2006 he has taught a juvenile law course Northeastern University School of Law.

Judge Blitzman is a Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Union College and alsoattended the London School of Economics as an undergraduate. He earned his J.D. in 1974 from Boston College Law School. Judge Blitzman also has acted as an advisor to the writing staffs of the legal dramas "The Trials of Rosie O'Neill" and "Judging Amy," and is a member of Actor's Equity and the Screen Actor's Guild.

David Arthur Colley is a private practitioner in Columbus, Ohio whose practice has focused on childrens issues, including representation of children, parents, foster parents, and adoptive parents in civil, criminal and juvenile court proceedings. Mr. Colley has served as counsel to public and private child care agencies and has conducted numerous trainings of judges, lawyers, and child welfare professionals on a range of juvenile matters. He is the author of child welfare training curricula used in Ohio and other states.

Matthew Cregor is a staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center. He works on federal, state, and local policy efforts to improve school climate (e.g., school discipline code reform, expansion of state-level structures for Positive Behavior Supports, and federal law/policy initiatives to improve school climate). Matt also co-facilitates the Dignity in Schools Campaign’s Alternatives to Zero-Tolerance Working Group – a national coalition of teachers, parents, and advocates working to expand practices that improve school climate and reduce suspension, expulsion, and referrals to law enforcement. Matt taught 5th grade in the Bronx, NY as a Teach for America Corps Member and is a 2006 graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center.

Vanessa Coterel, Esq., Director, Child and Youth Law Program, Legal Aid Society of Columbus. Vanessa graduated from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law in 2002. Vanessa has represented children in a wide range of cases, including delinquency; status offenses; abuse, neglect and dependency; judicial by-pass; Medicaid; and education.

Vanessa began practicing law as a staff attorney for Ohio Legal Rights Service (OLRS), where she primarily represented children with disabilities in education and Medicaid disputes. In addition to individual case work, she represented over 280,000 Ohio children with disabilities in a federal class action challenging the formula for funding special education and for the failure of the Ohio Department of Education to adequately monitor and enforce the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

Vanessa left OLRS to serve as the Child and Youth Law Program Director and to build a program that provides direct representation to youth at the Legal Aid Society of Columbus. In that capacity, Vanessa created a medical-legal collaboration for children, which places attorneys on-site at Nationwide Children’s Hospital to address the civil legal needs of patients. In order to advance CYLP's goal to enforce the rights of central Ohio's most vulnerable youth, Vanessa also established projects in the areas of foster care rights and juvenile justice. Most recently, Vanessa filed an amicus brief in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals regarding the rights of children to behavioral and community mental health services under Medicaid’s Early and Periodic, Screening, Diagnosis and Treatment program. Organizations signing onto that brief included each of Ohio's legal services programs; the National Health Law Program; the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law; the National Disability Rights Network; and the protection and advocacy programs in Michigan, Kentucky, and Tennessee.

Katherine Hunt Federle, Professor of Law and Director, Center for Interdisciplinary Law & Policy Studies and the Justice for Children Project, The Ohio State University Michael E. Moritz College of Law. Professor Katherine Hunt Federle received her B.A. in History from Pomona College in 1980, her J.D. from Seattle University School of Law in 1983, and her LL.M. in Trial Advocacy from Georgetown University Law Center in 1986. She began her legal career as a public defender in the state of Washington. She then received a prestigious E. Barrett Prettyman Fellowship from Georgetown University Law Center, where she supervised third-year law students in the Juvenile Justice Clinic and represented children and adults in both the D.C. court system and the federal courts.

Professor Federle began teaching in 1986 at the University of Hawaii School of Law, where she held a dual appointment as a researcher at the Center for Youth Research. She subsequently joined the faculty at Tulane Law School in 1990 where she taught Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, and Juvenile Law. Professor Federle was selected by the 1996 graduating class to receive the Felix Frankfurter Distinguished Teaching Award. Professor Federle has been especially active in the field of juvenile law. She is admitted to practice in Ohio, Washington, Hawaii, and the District of Columbia, and draws on her extensive experience as a lawyer for children in her teaching and writing. Professor Federle has given Congressional briefings on law-related education and child witnesses, has spoken and presented papers at conferences across the country and around the world on issues pertaining to children's rights and criminal law, and has written numerous articles on the rights of children.

She serves on the Legal Representation Subcommittee of the Ohio Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Children, Families, and the Courts, the Competency Working Group of the Juvenile Issues Subcommittee of the Ohio Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Mentally Ill in the Courts, the Editorial Advisory Board of the International Journal of Children's Rights, the Ohio State Bar Association Juvenile Justice Committee, and the Juvenile Justice Planning Community Initiative of the Franklin County Domestic Relations and Juvenile Court. Professor Federle also serves as a member of the American Bar Association Litigation Section's Children Rights Committee Working Group and is co-chair of the Child Welfare Subcommittee of the American Bar Association Litigation Section's Children's Rights Committee. She also is a past chair of the American Bar Association Family Law Section's Committee on Juvenile Law and the Needs of Children. While serving as chair, Professor Federle helped draft the ABA's Standards for the Representation of Children in Abuse and Neglect Cases. She also serves as the faculty advisor to a law student organization, Advocates for Children. She has been recognized for her work with the American Bar Association Family Law Section, the Children's Rights Committee of the American Bar Association Litigation Section, and the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

Professor Federle teaches Criminal Law, Family Law, Children and the Law, Advanced Issues in the Law of Foster Care, Issues in Adoption Law, and the Justice for Children Practicum at The Ohio State University Michael E. Moritz College of Law and is the Director of the Justice for Children Project, an interdisciplinary educational and research project housed in the Moritz College of Law. Professor Federle also is the Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Law and Policy Studies at The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law.

H.D. “De” Kirkpatrick, Ph.D., ABPP. Dr. “De” Kirkpatrick is a clinical and forensic psychologist in private practice in Charlotte, North Carolina. He also holds a diploma in forensic psychology from the American Board of Professional Psychology and is a member of the American Academy of Forensic Psychology. He often testifies as an expert witness in both civil and criminal matters. He is also on the Board of Directors of theNational Association of Counsel for Children and is a member of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts. De is also an aspiring murder mystery writer, having just completed his first manuscript, Alienation of Affection.

John Lawson, Esq. John Lawson graduated from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law in 1976. He has a long history as an advocate for the rights of individuals and has worked for the betterment of all. He has been the attorney for the May 4th Task Force of Kent State University for 30 years. He started the Free Medical Clinic of Greater Cleveland's runaway shelter and Free Legal Clinic. He also started the first recycling program in Cleveland and was a founding Board member of Cleveland Public Radio. John is a former Cleveland city council member and a former adjunct professor at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. John was the director of the legal department at Cleveland Works and later became its director. He has practiced extensively in juvenile and family courts and is currently in private practice.

Angela M. Lloyd, Associate Clinical Professor of Law, The Ohio State University Michael E. Moritz College of Law. Professor Lloyd received her B.A from the University of Notre Dame, her M.A. from The Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy - Tufts University, and her J.D. from Columbia University. Professor Lloyd is presently an Associate Professor of Clinical Law at the Moritz College of Law, where she teaches in the Justice for Children Practicum. Before joining Ohio State, she worked at Covenant House New Jersey where she served as a senior staff attorney and then as Director of the Youth Advocacy Center and Medical Office. Upon graduation from law school, Professor Lloyd clerked for the Honorable Warren G. Ferguson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Susan Vivian Mangold, Professor of Law, State University of New York at Buffalo School of Law. Susan Vivian Mangold is Professor of Law at the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Law. She has developed courses entitled Introduction to Family Violence, Child Advocacy and the Law, Child Welfare Law, State as Custodian, Law Guardian Practice and Evidence, and The Child Victim. Professor Mangold has published in the field of child welfare law and has presented to audiences of lawyers, social workers, physicians, and others engaged in the protection of children. She was an organizer of the Urban Girls: Entering a New Millennium Conference in April 2000 which gathered over 800 teens, advocates, and scholars to address the unique issues of girls in urban settings as well as other conferences and workshops addressing economic justice, domestic violence, and other issues that impact the lives of children.

Professor Mangold is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School. At law school, she was Executive Director of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau and a co-founder of the Children's Rights Project. She was a staff attorney at the Juvenile Law Center for five years before entering academics. At the Juvenile Law Center, she represented children in abuse and neglect cases and worked on impact litigation in the child welfare, juvenile justice, and mental health areas.

Judge Colleen M. O’Toole was elected to the Eleventh District Court of Appeals in 2004. She is a graduate of Hawken College Preparatory School and received her B.A. from John Carroll University in 1983, majoring in History and Political Science, where she also studied for her Masters Degree in Soviet History. Before entering law school, she worked as a Marketing Representative for Sherwin Williams Company and as a Customer Service Manager for Progressive Insurance Company. She attended Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, where she received her J.D. in 1990.

Following admission to the Ohio Bar in 1991, Judge O’Toole practiced law in the Cuyahoga County Public Defender’s Office as both a law clerk and a Litigation and Appellate Attorney. Subsequent to that, she worked with the National Interstate Company in Cleveland as a Litigation Manager. In 1995, she joined Kramer and Niermann, LPA (now Kramer & Associates, LPA) and worked with them as counsel until 1998, when she opened her own practice, The Law Offices of Colleen M. O’Toole, concentrating in Cuyahoga, Summit, Geauga and Lake Counties. She is experienced in civil, criminal and corporate litigation, as well as family law.

Judge O’Toole is admitted to the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, the United States Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the United States Supreme Court. She has held memberships in the American, Cleveland, Ohio, Lake County and Geauga County Bar Associations and has been a member of the Cuyahoga County Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, The Ohio Bar Association, the Board of Governor’s Criminal Law Section & Litigation Section, and the Association of Trial Lawyers of America. She also serves as an Adjunct Professor of Business Law at John Carroll University, has served as a Guardian Ad Litem through the Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court, and was on the Board of Directors of the Greater Cleveland Ecology Association.

She serves as a member of the Ohio Judicial Conference on the Court Administration Committee, Ad Hoc Committee on Community Corrections, the joint subcommittee on Court Reporting & Transcripts, and the Court Technology Committee.

She was appointed by Chief Justice Moyer to the Ohio Criminal Sentencing Commission and was appointed to serve as a Visiting Judge on the Ohio Supreme Court in the Death Penalty appeal of State v. White.

Judge O’Toole resides with her husband David Cardillo, and three children, Nicholas,Michael and Fallyn, in Concord, Ohio.

Robin Palmer, LISW, BA, MSSA. Roberta (Robin) Palmer earned her Master of Social Service Administration from Case Western Reserve University in 1988. She is licensed by the State of Ohio as an Independent Social Worker. Her licenses allow her to provide assessments, diagnosis and treatment for emotional and mental disorders. She has specialized training in the assessment and treatment of juveniles who engage in sexual offending behavior. Ms. Palmer is a member of NASW. Ms. Palmer is a trained polygraph examiner. Her training was obtained through the National Training Center of Polygraph Science (1996) and The Argenbright International Institute of Polygraph (1999). She has been trained in statement analysis through Laboratory for Scientific Interrogation. She has also been trained in neurofeedback (direct training of brain functioning) through EEG Spectrum International (2003).

Ms. Palmer is the Director of The Mokita Center, Inc. which she founded in 1986. The Mokita Center is well known for its service provisions to clients who have been found delinquent or guilty of sex offenses. Ms. Palmer has been involved in assessments, diagnostic services, counseling, polygraph examinations, and administrative services such as program planning in her position at The Mokita Center, Inc. The Mokita Center, Inc. has had contracts and/or provided services for clients of Cuyahoga Juvenile Court, Ohio Department of Youth Services, Adult Parole Authority, Lorain County Juvenile Court, Cuyahoga County Department of Children and Family Services, Parmadale, and Berea Children's Home.

Ms. Palmer is also the Director of Play by the Rules, Inc. which she developed. Play by the Rules is an innovative public awareness campaign focused on reducing child sexual abuse. This program developed out of her work at The Mokita Center and her recognition that many of the youths she worked with lacked any knowledge of the legal issues involved with sexual behavior. In this position, Ms. Palmer has developed an educational program for middle and high school students to increase their awareness of the legal rules for consent for sex in the state of Ohio and the consequences for violating those rules and increase their understanding of what the law considers sex to be. The program is also being presented to various community groups.

Prior to her development of The Mokita Center, Inc., Ms. Palmer developed the Victim Protection Program for Parmadale Family Services. In her position as Clinical Supervisor, Ms. Palmer provided supervision to clinical and non-clinical staff, program development and treatment services to youth and families accepted into the program.

Ms. Palmer was also employed at West Side Mental Health Center where she developed an adolescent sex offender treatment program and the Cuyahoga County Adolescent Sex Offender Network.

Ms Palmer has provided training, consultation, program evaluation, and polygraphs for numerous sex offender programs across Ohio. These trainings and consultations have focused on program development and clinical and non-clinical service provisions for the adult and juvenile sex offender population.

Paul Skendelas, Appellate Public Defender, Franklin County Public Defender. Paul Skendelas is a 1981 graduate of the Moritz College of Law. He has been with the Franklin County Public Defender office since 1980, and has been in the appellate division of that office for the past 21 years. During this time, he has handled over 850 appeals in state and federal courts. He has been a frequent contributor to conferences and symposia on criminal, juvenile, and appellate issues for numerous organizations, including the Ohio CLE Institute, the Ohio Public Defender Advocacy Institute, the Columbus Bar Association, and the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. He co-presented a paper with Professor Federle at an international conference on “Law, Mind, and Brain” held at the University College London on the implications of brain development research on concepts of competency, culpability, and punishment of youthful offenders. He is the past amicus chair for the Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and is a past president of that organization. He is currently the chair of the Juvenile Law Section of the Ohio State Bar Association.

First Lady Dr. Frances Strickland shares the Governor's vision of a better future for Ohioans. Frances was born in Kentucky, where she grew up on a dairy farm. Like the Governor, she had the opportunity to pursue higher education and eventually earned a doctorate in educational psychology at the University of Kentucky --where she met her future husband.

After graduation, Frances worked many years in a public school system as an educational psychologist. She authored a screening test for kindergarten-age children and a children’s book, The Little Girl Who Grew Up To Be Governor.

As first lady of Ohio, Frances works on a number of initiatives. In addition to serving as the chair of the Family and Children First Councils, Frances lends her help to work on education, the environment, renewable energy, and inclusion. Happily married almost 20 years, Ted and Frances share an uncommon commitment to the people of Ohio.

The Honorable Steven C. Teske, Clayton County Juvenile Court, Jonesboro, Georgia. Judge Teske received his Associate of Arts in Political Science from Clayton State University (formerly Clayton Jr. College), Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies in Law & Society from Georgia State University (cum laude), Master of Arts in Political Science from Georgia State University, and Juris Doctor from Georgia State University College of Law (having been awarded "Outstanding Student Litigator" by the American Board of Trial Advocates).

Prior to going into the practice of law, Judge Teske was employed with the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles as a parole officer in the inner city of Atlanta and later promoted to Chief of the Atlanta Parole District and Deputy Director of Field Services responsible for Offender Program Development. As Deputy Director, Judge Teske was charged with developing a new supervision program for parolees. He traveled the country on technical assistance from the National Institute of Corrections to observe programs proven successful in reducing recidivism among offenders.

Judge Teske left the Board of Pardons and Paroles to practice law and subsequently became a partner in the firm of Boswell & Teske with offices in Atlanta and Jonesboro. During his practice of law, Judge Teske served as a Special Assistant Attorney General representing the Clayton County Department of Family & Children Services, including the civil prosecution of child abuse and neglect cases. He also represented other state agencies in matters involving state tort and civil rights litigation.

Judge Teske is admitted to practice in Georgia and before the Georgia Court of Appeals, Georgia Supreme Court, U.S. District Court (Northern District), 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court. Judge Teske is a member of the National Council of Juvenile & Family Court Judges and the Georgia Council of Juvenile Court Judges and currently serves as its president. He is a member of the American Correctional Association (having been elected to serve on the Delegate Assembly representing adult community corrections) and the American Probation & Parole Association.

He currently serves as President of the Southern Crescent Habitat for Humanity and is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Good Shepherd Clinic. For his efforts in detention reform, Judge Teske has received the Judge Romae T. Powell Award from the Juvenile Courts Association of Georgia, Howard Ables Award from the Georgia Juvenile Services Association, Community Service Awards from the Clayton County NAACP and Clayton County Bar Association, and Outstanding Leadership Award from the Georgia Association of Homes for Children. Furthermore, the FAST-START juvenile detention alternative program is the recipient of the 2005 President's Award of the American Probation and Parole Association. Judge Teske also has published articles related to juvenile detention reform in The Link, published by the Child Welfare League of America titled "Using Collaborative Strategies to Reinvent Juvenile Justice" and in Juvenile and Family Justice Today published by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges titled "Reducing Detention Using Collaborative Strategies: It Takes a Community." He has also published an article on Court Appointed Special Advocates in @ LAW titled "CASA: Watchdogs for the Abused & Neglected."