|
|
 |
|
|
| Common Ground in Uncommon Courtrooms |
In Where in the World is Carmen Santiago? game players string together clues to track the international spy, ultimately learning world geography and history along the way.
In Where in the World are MSU-DCL Alumni and Faculty? you’ll find alumnae Margaret A. Costello, ’88, and Patricia Streeter, ’79, along with MSU-DCL adjunct faculty member and 1995 University of Detroit graduate Deborah Skorupski routinely crossing the international dateline, navigating cultural nuances, upholding U.S business and citizen interests, and, ultimately, finding common ground in sometimes uncommon courtrooms. |
BY CHRIS HENNING
Margaret Costello’s itinerary has taken her to the Hague and Paris, and has delivered immigrants seeking legal counsel to her practice in Detroit. Streeter continues to play a role in the democratization of Lithuania. This year Skorupski will visit Russia, Kenya and Ireland to help students at those countries’ leading law universities to improve their moot court performance.
While their destinations vary, the three agree that a practice in international law is grounded in U.S. domestic law, economics and business—whether dealing with corporations or citizens.
Margaret Costello, of Dykema Gossett’s Detroit office, says what’s helped her most in courtrooms near and far, including the U.S.-Iran Claims Tribunal where she’s argued, was her preparation in trial advocacy while a law student.
“The actual hands-on training I received prepared me very well to be able to advocate in a variety of forums, whether domestic or international,” she says.
 |
|
| Margaret Costello |
|
She often argues land expropriation claims—one of the most common international legal disputes heard in tribunals—arising from illegally seized property or loss of business during conflict.
In one such case, Costello represented a physician of dual citizenship whose land, worth millions, had been seized by the Iranian government—illegally, he claimed. His claim was upheld, and he successfully brought suit against the Iranian government.
In international tribunals, cultural differences abound—in the U.S.-Iran Claims Tribunal, for example, the government of Iran opens with a reading from the Koran, and witnesses swear an oath to Allah. Tribunal court hearings also are brief, lasting two or three “very full” days, says Costello, despite the inherent language barriers that require interpreters to simultaneously and instantaneously translate the testimony and argument into each country’s native language. As efficient as the hearings are, though, the wheels of international justice, particularly in the tribunal setting, move very slowly —too slowly, in fact, to maintain a viable international law practice. Out-of-court preparation and the rendering of a verdict typically each take years on either side of the hearing to complete.
“Certainly,” says Costello, “the cases are worthwhile, and the awards can be huge. It’s just that there’s not a stream of such cases—maybe one every three or four years—and it may take five years for a judgment, but even then there may be applications for clarification of awards or other challenges to the award. Just the same, she says, having the extra skill set in her lawyer’s toolbox has proven valuable time and again. While her primary practice focuses on litigation, dispute resolution and appeals in U.S. courts, her understanding and expertise in international conventions and treaties on aspects such as international child abduction have delivered many private and pro bono cases to her practice. Her work in civil aspects of international child abduction and custody has been recognized by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
 |
|
| Deborah Skorupski |
|
Deborah Skorupski’s toolbox has parlayed mastery of a second language—French—and a vast store of knowledge in comparative civil law, French law, European history and international business into yet another path less traveled.
As a practicing attorney, she uses her education primarily to handle mergers involving international corporations and, secondarily, to help immigrants navigate the U.S. legal system.
Now, in addition to her law practice, she teaches at MSU-DCL in admiralty, transnational legal research, comparative family law, and criminal procedure. She also runs the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition and coached MSU-DCL’s team to a first-place showing this year (see related story).
While she has traveled extensively abroad, Skorupski is quick to point out that graduates will find abundant opportunities to practice international law without leaving home.
“There’s a misunderstanding that lawyers or students from other countries have to take the New York bar and practice in New York,” she says. “While high profile companies have offices in New York, London, Paris and Tokyo, Detroit is home to many worldwide businesses. International shipping starts here on the Great Lakes. Detroit Edison is the lead shipper of coal and electrical products in the world. Ford, the largest international employer in the world, is headquartered in Detroit. And one of the largest Immigration and Naturalization Services offices is here.”
With the proximity to Windsor, she says, “opportunities for students interested in international law are right across the street.”
Lithuania isn’t exactly “across the street” for solo practitioner
 |
|
| Patricia Streeter |
|
Patricia Streeter, but that’s where she found new purpose and practice by aiding in broad reforms in her family’s homeland.
Her first trip to the newly independent Lithuania in 1991 to visit relatives was an eye-opening experience. Although Lithuania had declared its independence, the Soviet Union still occupied the country, and its military remained undeniably active, controlling Lithuanian television and radio stations, its tanks patrolling the streets. Thirteen unarmed demonstrators had been killed recently. Within days of her return to the U.S., the Soviet Union disintegrated and the process of reformation in Lithuania began in earnest. Streeter’s efforts to aid that process also have been in earnest.
“Women entering the legal profession see and hear of the success stories of women such as U.S. Supreme Court Justices Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg; Michigan Supreme Court Justices Dorothy Comstock Riley, Patricia Boyle, Elizabeth Weaver and Marilyn Kelley; and former State Bar of Michigan President Victoria Roberts. They are confident that the road has been paved for them, and that obstacles have been removed. They do not believe or want to believe that they are almost certain to encounter gender bias at some stage in their careers that will have the potential to adversely affect their advancement. Because of their complacency, they are unprepared when reality strikes, and often react by changing jobs or careers, or simply dropping out of the work force—in too many cases, depriving the legal profession of their skills and talents.”
Margaret A. Costello, 1997 v.3 Det. C.L. Rev., “Women in the Legal Profession: You’ve Come a Long Way—Or Have You?”
|
 |
For the past four years, she’s been an adjunct professor at Vytautas Magnus University Law School in Kaunas, most recently teaching private law of the sea (maritime and admiralty). Lithuanian students who take her courses earn credit toward the Certificate in Transnational Law awarded by MSU-DCL (see page 31 for a list of students receiving the certificate this year).
Since 1996, Streeter has been actively involved in the Lithuanian-American Bar Association, Inc., or LABAS which, interestingly, means “hello” in Lithuanian. As current president of the organization, she helps to promote the rule of law and development of the legal profession there, also advising government and business leaders and supporting legal educational activities. She visits the country annually as it transforms itself to a market economy and independent democracy.
“I’m intrigued by the significance of international business in this reform,” she says. “Despite being independent since 1991, they did not initially have a legal system in place to support a free market economy, and it was not enough to transfer business ownership into private hands to create a functioning market economy without full implementation of legal reform. Without a domestic legal system that uniformly enforces the rights of the parties to a contract, the free market cannot thrive or attract foreign business partners and foreign investment.”
The communist system that Lithuania inherited also lacked an ethical legal profession as we know it. “Many there, particularly those who did well playing by the rules of the old regime, see little value in changing to a more ethical pattern of practice,” Streeter notes. “They don’t understand why lawyers would voluntarily follow a code of conduct that would reduce their ability to make money. But with many Lithuanian law students now studying abroad where codes of ethics apply, and with the establishment of new law schools and legal curricula, there is promise.”
She says the most important lessons she learned in her studies at DCL—lessons that have served her well across the globe—were perseverance and problem solving.
“International law, for the most part,” she says, “is not a separate body of law but the ability to transact business with those from another legal system who have other social and business customs.”
Neither Skorupski nor Streeter nor Costello anticipated the impact their training in international law would have on the world stage. But with passports in hand, and a valise chock-full of education, experience and expertise, they are, indeed, shaping the face of law near and far. Wherever in the world their next path takes them, they’ll continue to serve corporations and citizens across the globe.
| MSU-DCL Jessup Brief Ranked First in the World! |
 |
Some of the world’s brightest and best up-and-coming international law students took center stage in Washington, D.C. this past April.
In the only international competition with broader representation than the Olympics, the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition drew entries from 483 law schools representing 65 countries across the globe. But at the end of the day, it was East Lansing, Michigan’s “hometown” team—comprising third-year MSU-DCL students Nic Camargo and Jina Han and second years Joe Harte, David Pizzuti and Camille VanBuren—who brought home the gold, placing first in the Hardy C. Dillard Competition, the research and writing component of the international Jessup Competition.
The competition’s founder, Philip C. Jessup, became an international judge and often sat for moot court competitions. Lacking, he noted, were international law competitions and, aided by friends and colleagues 50 years ago, he first launched and then grew the annual event to its current international status and renown.
Not only does the Jessup outpace the Olympics from an international perspective, but it’s also the world’s largest “peaceable” function, notes MSU-DCL adjunct faculty member Deborah Skorupski, who advises the school’s team each year. “It’s a phenomenal event overall,” she says. “And it goes farther than most anything else to further international relations and understanding among different countries and cultures. What ends up happening is you have an academic exercise that gets everybody there, then opportunities throughout the competition to sit down and discuss international events one on one.”
Teams worldwide are presented the same problem, typically an issue or issues of current significance. This year’s: wartime rape and border corruption. Student teams prepared briefs that considered the world community’s stance on women who are raped or recruited and trafficked for prostitution. Should individuals be punished? The offending country? And at what point does the world community take a stand and punish the country involved?
U.S. teams first compete at the regional level and then advance to a national competition; other countries with more than two law schools send their winning team to D.C.
All first-time participants, MSU-DCL team members burned the candle at both ends, working as late as 5 a.m. some days. While other students took advantage of the Martin Luther King holiday, the Jessup team pretty well bunked in at the law school—adhering to page limits and word counts, writing and revising around the clock. Their brief won at the regional competition, then was re-graded and ranked number one in the world. Their work paid off when Skorupski opened the announcement to learn that the “first-timers” had taken the top prize. “This really puts MSU-DCL in the upper echelon of our academic work product from the international perspective,” she notes.
There’s a distinct international flavor all the way around in regard to this year’s team: for starters, Han hails from South Korea, Harte lived there for several years, Camargo is a native of Colombia, and Pizutti and VanBuren both have traveled abroad extensively. As for Skorupski, she is teaching students this summer at St. Petersburg in Russia, the University of Nairobi in Kenya, and Trinity College in Dublin— helping them prepare for next year’s competition—before returning to train a new MSU-DCL team.
And the world—much like the finish line at race’s end—grows a little bit closer.
|
|
|
