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1971
Alan J. Mogol of Baker Donelson was elected to the board of directors of the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association, a national trade association representing companies in the equipment finance sector. A shareholder in Baker Donelson’s Baltimore office, Mogol concentrates his practice in structuring and negotiating equipment finance transactions, as well as developing standard equipment lease/ loan and syndication documentation.
As a longtime member of ELFA, Mogol has served on the organization’s lawyers committee and education committee. In 2016 he was named the recipient of ELFA’s Edward A. Groobert Award for Legal Excellence. That same year he was listed in Leasing News as one of the 25 Most Influential Attorneys in Leasing and Finance. Mogol has been recognized by Best Lawyers in America in the area of equipment finance law since 2007 and in the area of banking and finance law since 2017. He was named the Best Lawyers - Baltimore banking and finance law Lawyer of the Year for 2017 and 2020. He is a frequent lecturer and author in the equipment financing area.
The third edition of Mark E. Sullivan’s book, “The Military Divorce Handbook,” was published by the American Bar Association in May 2019 and is in its second printing. Sullivan and his wife, Teri, enjoyed trips to San Francisco; Hawaii; Charleston, S.C.; and Chicago in 2019.
Robert M. Spiller Jr. retired (again) in November. Spiller’s first career was as a trial attorney and associate chief counsel for enforcement for the Food and Drug Administration from 1971 to 2003. For his second career, Spiller served as a contract instructor in FDA law for new FDA employees for 16 years.
Taylor Reveley ’68, president emeritus of William & Mary and former dean of its law school, and Stephen Hermann ’69 had the opportunity to reminisce in Williamsburg, Va., last fall. Reveley was the opening speaker at the Annual Meeting of the American College of Environmental Lawyers, which Herrmann founded in 2007.
1972
Larry Berger serves as an honorary trustee of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where he previously acted as general counsel and secretary. Berger is also a member of the board of directors of the Philadelphia Youth Sports Collaborative.
George House was named to Business North Carolina’s Hall of Fame for environmental law. House is a partner with Brooks Pierce in Greensboro. House was also named in Best Lawyers in America 2020 for environmental law, environmental litigation, mining law, natural resources law and water law, as well as in North Carolina Super Lawyers for environmental litigation.
1974
The Virginia Bar Association inducted James M. Bowling IV of St. John, Bowling, Lawrence & Quagliana as a life member in recognition of his 40 years of continuous membership in the Virginia Bar Association.
Douglas Branson’s 24th book is forthcoming this year. “Baseball’s Turbulent Years: Drug Abuse, Labor Strife, and the Rise of Black Power” will be published by McFarland.
Claire Gastañaga, executive director of ACLU of Virginia, was named as a 2019 Leader in the Law by Virginia Lawyers Weekly.
Richard Menaker writes that after 35 years of practice at Menaker & Hermann, his firm is now affiliated with Offit Kurman in New York City. Menaker is a principal and tries commercial cases in state and federal courts, and in arbitration.
The Virginia Bar Association inducted Frederick W. Payne of Payne & Hodous as a life member in recognition of his 40 years of continuous membership.
James C. Shannon retired in May 2019. In October he was awarded the Hunter W. Martin Professionalism Award by the Bar Association of the City of Richmond, Va. The award is presented to members who, throughout their lives and careers in the law, have best exemplified the conduct and high ideals embodied in the bar’s Principles of Professionalism.
John F. Wymer III joined Thompson Hine in Atlanta. A partner in the labor and employment group, Wymer represents public, private and government employers of all sizes in state and federal courts across the country, as well as before the National Labor Relations Board, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, U.S. Department of Labor and other administrative agencies. Wymer was named to Lawdragon’s Corporate Employment Lawyers Hall of Fame and is a fellow in the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers.
1975
Chuck Howard left Shipman & Goodwin after 38 years — the last five as general counsel — receiving both Lifetime Achievement and New England Trailblazer awards from the Connecticut Law Tribune. In September, he began work as the executive director of the International Ombudsman Association, where he continues to promote and support ombuds programs.
The Virginia Bar Association recently inducted Edward H. Mcnew Jr. of Crozet, Va., as a life member in recognition of his 40 years of continuous membership.
Gibbons ’75, Vance ’85, Walker ’94 Elected to American Law Institute
Federal judge Julia Smith Gibbons ’75, Joyce White Vance ’85 and Helgi C. Walker ’94 were elected to the American Law Institute, the leading independent organization in the United States producing scholarly work to clarify, modernize and otherwise improve the law.
Gibbons has served on the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals since 2002. She previously served since 1983 as a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee, including six years as chief judge. Gibbons also worked as a legal adviser to then-Gov. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and in private practice.
Vance is a Distinguished Professor of the Practice of Law at the University of Alabama School of Law. From 2009 to 2017, she was U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, where she served on the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee and was the co-chair of its Criminal Practice Subcommittee. Before becoming a U.S. attorney, Vance served as an assistant U.S. attorney in Birmingham for 18 years. She spent 10 years as a criminal prosecutor before moving to the Appellate Division in 2002, becoming chief three years later. In February she discussed criminal justice reform on the Law School podcast “Common Law.”
Walker is a partner in Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher’s Washington, D.C., office, where she is co-chair of the firm’s administrative law and regulatory practice group and a member of the appellate and constitutional law group. From 2010 to 2015, she was a public member of the Council of the Administrative Conference of the United States, which is composed of leading authorities on administrative law. Walker worked in the White House Counsel’s Office as associate counsel to President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2003.
Professors Ashley Deeks and Deborah Hellman were also elected to the ALI.
—Mike Fox
1976
Bill Cary was selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America 2020 for employment law for management; labor law for management; and litigation for labor and management. He was also recognized in North Carolina Super Lawyers. Cary is a partner with Brooks Pierce in Greensboro.
S. Miles Dumville serves as chair of the Virginia Bar Association’s Civil Litigation Section, vice chair of the advisory board for the UVA Cancer Center and president of the Edman Forest Owners Association. He is senior counsel with Reed Smith in Richmond.
Jim Hingeley was elected commonwealth’s attorney for Albemarle County, Va., and took office Jan. 1.
James J. Lee was recognized by Best Lawyers as 2020 Lawyer of the Year for bankruptcy litigation in Dallas/Fort Worth. Lee is currently of counsel to Vinson & Elkins, having retired from the partnership at the end of 2018.
Donald W. Lemons received the 2019 American Inns of Court Lewis F. Powell Jr. Award for Professionalism and Ethics. Since 2015, Lemons has been the chief justice of the Supreme Court of Virginia, where he not only presides over the court but serves as the chief administrative officer managing Virginia’s judicial system. “Even as he has risen to lead the oldest Supreme Court in the United States, he has retained the values of a country lawyer,” said Kannon K. Shanmugam, a partner at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison in Washington, D.C., one of Lemons’ nominators. “He is a role model in how a judge should conduct himself from the bench. He treats everyone he encounters with respect.”
Lemons served two terms as president of the American Inns of Court from 2010 to 2014. He was president of the John Marshall Inn from 2002 to 2004 and a master of the bench there and at the Lewis F. Powell Jr. Inn, both in Richmond. In 2008, the Honourable Society of the Middle Temple in London named him an honorary master of the bench in appreciation for his part in recognizing the Inn’s role in founding Jamestown and the commonwealth of Virginia.
Lemons was elected to the court by Virginia’s General Assembly in 2000. He was previously a judge on the Court of Appeals of Virginia and on the Circuit Court of the city of Richmond, where he was a pioneer in the drug court movement.
John Vering was elected a fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers and was selected by Best Lawyers 2020 as lawyer of the year in labor litigation and employment for Kansas City, Mo.
1977
J. William Gray joined Whiteford, Taylor & Preston’s nonprofit organizations and associations practice in Richmond, Va. Gray advises on the formation of charities, business leagues, social welfare organizations, title-holders and other exempt entities, advising them on tax reporting, disclosure and corporate governance issues. Additionally, he advises high net worth clients in their charitable gift planning. A fellow of the American College of Trust & Estate Counsel, Gray is a founding director and former president of the Virginia Gift Planning Council. He recently served on the National Association of Charitable Gift Planners’ board of directors and is a frequent speaker at state and national programs on charitable giving, nonprofit formation, planned giving and compliance.
David A. Logan, dean emeritus and professor at the Roger Williams University School of Law, was appointed an adviser on the American Law Institute’s Restatement of the Law Third, Torts: Defamation and Privacy. This project is part of ALI’s ongoing revision of the second restatement and addresses torts dealing with personal and business reputation and dignity, including defamation, business disparagement and rights of privacy. Among other issues, the updates will cover the substantial body of new issues relating to the internet. Logan wrote that he credits UVA Law professor Lilian BeVier for igniting his interest in the intersection between tort law and the First Amendment that has resulted in this honor.
Roliff Purrington returned from trips to the Ukraine, Myanmar, Northern Iraq and Colombia. He also joined the Houston boutique litigation firm, Gregor Cassidy and Wynne. 1978
Christopher D’Angelo authored the chapter “The Scope and Use of The Attorney-Client Privilege in the United States and Its Applicability to Communications in the U.S. and Abroad” in “The Attorney-Client Privilege in Civil Litigation: Protecting and Defending Confidentiality,” a seventh edition published by ABA Books. D’Angelo is chair of the business disputes and products liability practice and the chair of the international practice at Montgomery, McCracken, Walker & Rhoads, based in its Philadelphia and New York offices.
Mary Bland Love wrote that she “has retired from paying law work.” She remains of counsel with Marks Gray in Jacksonville, Fla., speaks on professionalism and conducts moot court (trial) service. Bland Love was reappointed to the Jacksonville Ethics Commission by Public Defender Charles Cofer ’77. She shared that she has “had a satisfactory career and is grateful for UVA Law’s preparation and reputation — that endure to this day!”
Last summer, Blake Morant, right, former dean of the George Washington University Law School, and J. Bruce Robertson LL.M. ’73, a retired justice of the Court of Appeal of New Zealand, met for the first time in Auckland. The meeting was facilitated by mutual friend Linda G. Howard ’73.
In September, GW Law unveiled Morant’s official portrait. Colleagues and friends in attendance were Ann Brown ’77, Eric Fontaine ’79, George Garrow ’79, Theodore King, Klinette Hunter Kindred and James Kurz ’76.
1979
Schiff Hardin partner Paul Dengel has worked with Chicago Volunteer Legal Services for the past 40 years.
After graduating, Dengel wanted to apply his skills to help people who needed legal assistance in lower-income communities and thought about starting a legal clinic.
At the same time, the CVLS put out a call for pro bono lawyers. Dengel realized that rather than start a clinic, Schiff Hardin attorneys could essentially “adopt” a CVLS clinic, staff it and do the one-on-one work they wanted to do. In 1979, lawyers volunteering at clinics was a novel idea, though it has now become a common practice.
Forty years later, other firms have adopted their own clinics and CVLS can conserve its resources by staffing their clinics with lawyers working pro bono. Dengel reports that his work on behalf of the CVLS Rogers Park Clinic has been one of the most rewarding facets of his career.
Mark Lester’s book “H. H. Asquith: Last of the Romans” was recently released by Lexington Books. The book chronicles the life of Asquith (1852–1928), the longest-serving British prime minister between Lord Liverpool (Robert Jenkinson) and Margaret Thatcher.
Randy Underwood was selected for inclusion in Best Lawyers in America 2020 for financial services regulation law and real estate. Underwood practices with Brooks Pierce in Greensboro, N.C.