Public Interest and Social Justice Law Celebration & Graduation Ceremony to be Held May 18th

The Honorable Risë Jones Pichon, of the Santa Clara County Superior Court, will serve as Keynote Speaker for the Celebration and Graduation Ceremony honoring public interest and social justice accomplishments on May 18 at 4 p.m. in the Williman Room in Benson Memorial Center on the Santa Clara University campus.

The ceremony will recognize 24 graduating Public Interest and Social Justice Law Scholars, 22 Public Interest and Social Justice Endowment Summer Fellowship Honorees, 73 Pro Bono Recognition Awardees, as well as the Justice John Paul Stevens Public Interest Fellowship Honorees.

Pami Vyas will receive the Herman Wildman Social Justice Law Writing Award for her essay Reconceptualizing Domestic Violence in India: Economic Abuse and the Need for Broad Statutory Interpretation to Promote Women’s Fundamental Rights. Pamela Vartabedian, of the class of 2006, will receive Honorable Mention for The Need to Hold Batterers Accountable: Admitting Prior Acts of Abuse in Cases of Domestic Violence.

Linda Starr, serving as the Legal Director of the Northern California Innocence Project at Santa Clara University School of Law will receive the Public Interest and Social Justice Recognition Award and Professor June Carbone will receive the Public Interest and Social Justice Achievement Award.  The ceremony will also recognize service by Peter Castle, a 2005-06 Public Interest Career Center Student Coordinator, and John B. Lough, Jr., the Center’s 2005-06 Assistant to the Director and Trina Grillo Research Associate. Dean Donald J. Polden will open the ceremony. Following Dean Polden’s comments, Cindy Avitia and Peter Castle, both of the Class of 2006, will deliver the student address.