Happy #NationalVoterRegistrationDay! Have you registered yet? Here’s a #throwback to when Professor Patty Ferguson-Bohnee and the ILC helped Agnes Laughter, a Navajo elder become a registered voter in 2008. “All of my heartache has changed as of this day,” said Laughter, who was 77 at the time. “I have an identity now. My thumbprint will stand. I feel fulfilled.” 💛 Register today to be #VoteReady
Category Archives: Indian Legal Clinic
Successful Pechanga Band Wills Clinic
On Sept. 23 and 24, Indian Legal Clinic students Cynthia Freeman (3L), Shayla Bowles (3L) and Cora Tso (3L) took part in the Pechanga Band Wills Clinic, led by Professor Helen Burtis (’07). The ILC partnered with the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians Tribal Leadership and the California Indian Legal Services to offer free legal services to the members of the Pechanga Band who wished to create wills for bequeathing their allotments.“The students did a tremendous job of building the clients’ trust in the limited amount of time available to them,” said Burtis. “Drafting Indian Wills is technically complex, and the students were dedicated to getting the clients’ estate planning wishes accurately incorporated into the documents.”
Read the full article on our blog here.
Native Vote Roundtable
| On Sept. 13, ILP hosted the Maricopa County Native American Voting Roundtable at the Beus Center for Law and Society. This event is part of the 2019-2020 Roundtable Project in which the county and the Elections Department are bringing in voter’s voices into the conversation of what needs to change in the election and voting process in underrepresented communities. Professor Patty Ferguson-Bohnee kicked off the event and started the discussion by asking questions on what needs to be changed and how those changes be implemented to improve access to voting from Native American voters. Several students, staff and faculty attended the event, including Professor Ferguson-Bohnee, ILC Program Coordinator Bari Barnes, Torey Dolan (’19), Brian Garcia (2L) and Hilary Edwards (1L). Edwards commented on her experience at the roundtable. “We are participating in shaping the future of our communities by voting,” Edwards said. “I was intrigued by the purpose of the roundtable project, which is to keep an open line of communication between protected groups, underrepresented communities and the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office. It’s incredible that the MCRO has created a space to be with these various groups of people to ensure that they have a clear understanding of the changes that ultimately impact them.” Barnes helped coordinate the roundtable, “I think these meetings are important because it’s a forum that provides communities direct access to those who shape the process for fair and equitable elections; at the same time it’s an opportunity for those governing the process to meet the folks they represent.” |
2018 Tribal Court Trial Skills
In June, 22 tribal court practitioners from Arizona, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, South Dakota, and Wyoming successfully completed the Indian Legal Clinic’s eighth bi-annual Tribal Court Trial Skills College, held at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. Students said the training was remarkable, challenging, and intensive and that it was a great opportunity to meet practitioners from other parts of the country. The four-day program provides practitioners with training on the skills necessary to try civil and criminal cases in tribal court. Faculty for the Tribal Court Trial Skills College were exceptionally qualified and experienced tribal court lawyers from throughout Arizona. Students received individual feedback and evaluations on their skills from sitting tribal court judges from throughout Arizona and California.
During the Trial Skills College, students received training in interviewing witnesses, pretrial motion strategy, trial strategy, jury selection, opening statements, how to take testimony, how to introduce evidence and to effectively make objections, and closing arguments. Training was followed by skill-directed practice in mock trial simulations. Students also learned about the history of federal Indian law and policy, ethical considerations of trial practice, tribal courtroom etiquette, and how to put together an effective trial notebook.
A heartfelt thank you goes to our faculty, tribal court judges, and alumni as well as everyone else who volunteered to role-play jurors and witnesses for our trial simulations.
Ferguson-Bohnee receives national appointments from Lawyers’ Committee, ABA
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| Patty Ferguson-Bohnee |
Professor Patty Ferguson-Bohnee, Faculty Director of the Indian Legal Program, was recentlyappointed National Commissioner for the Commission on Voting Rights by the organization Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights under the Law.
According to the Lawyers’ Committee, the Voting Rights Commission is dedicated to the struggle to achieve equality and protect advances in voting rights for racial and ethnic minorities and other traditionally disenfranchised groups.
Ferguson-Bohnee was also recently appointed by the American Bar Association (ABA) to the Coalition on Racial and Ethnic Justice and named Vice Chair of the ABA’s Committee on Native American Concerns of the Individual Rights and Responsibilities Section.
Ferguson-Bohnee has substantial experience in Indian law, election law and policy matters, voting rights, and status clarification of tribes. She has testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, and has represented tribal clients in administrative state, federal, and tribal courts, as well as before state and local governing bodies.
Students from the Indian Legal Clinic file Amicus Brief in The Supreme Court of the United States
Students in the Indian Legal Clinic were afforded a rare opportunity to apply their legal
knowledge in a case involving the Indian Child Welfare Act pending before the
United States Supreme Court. Indian Legal Clinic students Stephanie Whisnant, Stephanie Skogan, Brittney Burback, Michael Mainwold, Fernando Anzaldua, Kristin McPhie, Miguel Zarate, and Lily Yan, prepared the Brief of Amicus Curiae The National Native American Bar Association Supporting Affirmance under the supervision of Professors Robert Clinton and Patty Ferguson-Bohnee. The Court will hear oral
arguments in the case of Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, a minor child under the
age of 14, No. 12-399, on April 16.
To see brief click here: NNABA+Amicus
Can International Law Support Changes to Federal Indian Policy? Implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Conference
April 19, 2013 – 8:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m.
Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University
Great Hall, Armstrong Hall, 1100 S. McAllister Avenue, Tempe, AZ 85287
Free and Open to the Public – Registration requested.
Keynote Speaker: S. James Anaya, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Agenda and registration online at: http://conferences.asucollegeoflaw.com/drip/
Contact: Darlene Lester / darlene.lester@asu.edu / 480-965-7715
Sponsored by the Indian Legal Program & the Center for Law and Global Affairs at ASU
CLE Registration $150.00 is available for Attorneys seeking CLE credits.
CLE Credits: 5 CLE Credits for AZ & CA, 5.5 MCLE credits for NM
Live Web-streaming at: http://law.asu.edu/undrip2013
Please Join Us! Please help us spread the word about this important conference . 
Distinguished professor and executive director hired for Indian Legal Program
Distinguished professor and executive director hired for Indian Legal Program
01/31/2013
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| Robert Miller |
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| Gregory Hill |
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| Douglas Sylvester |
The College of Law has hired Robert J. Miller, one of the nation’s leading scholars in Indian Law, and Gregory L. Hill, who will serve as Executive Director of the Indian Legal Program.
“We consider our Indian Legal Program the nation’s leading organization devoted to improving the legal systems that affect tribal governments,” said Dean Douglas Sylvester. “The addition of Bob and Greg underscores our commitment not only to providing unique opportunities and experiences to students that relate to Indian law, but also to furthering the Program’s other key objectives, including maintaining and expanding our close relationships with American Indian nations and other native governments and organizations.”
Miller will join the faculty in the fall of 2013. As a professor at Lewis & Clark Law School in Portland, Ore., since 1999, Miller has taught various courses, including Federal Indian Law, American Indians and International Law and Civil Procedure.
He worked at the Stoel Rives law firm from 1992-1995 and practiced Indian law with Hobbs, Straus, Dean & Walker from 1995-1999. An enrolled citizen of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma, Miller is Chief Justice of the Court of Appeals of the Grand Ronde Tribe and sits as a judge for other tribes.
He is the author of two books, “Native America, Discovered and Conquered: Thomas Jefferson, Lewis and Clark, and Manifest Destiny” and “Reservation Capitalism: Economic Development in Indian Country.” He is also co-author of “Discovering Indigenous Lands: The Doctrine of Discovery in the English Colonies.”
“I am very excited about joining the College of Law and its outstanding Indian Legal Program,” Miller said. “I am looking forward to working with the ASU students, faculty and staff and to enjoying many rewarding intellectual and professional experiences at the College.”
Hill, a practicing attorney for 18 years, has held various leadership positions in the legal profession since 1995. A member of the Oneida Nation, Six Nations of Indians, he most recently served as a capital attorney in the Office of the Public Defender in Tampa, Fla., where he provided legal services to indigent clients.
He is a former deputy director of Stetson University College of Law’s National Clearinghouse for Science, Technology and the Law. Additionally, Hill served as Assistant Attorney General in the state of Florida, ran a solo legal practice earlier in his career, and clerked for the general counsel of the Seneca Nation while in law school.
“I am honored to be selected to serve as the executive director of the Indian Legal Program,” Hill said. “The chance to contribute to such a distinguished program, to help our students become better prepared for the future they will encounter, and to directly support the Indian communities will create opportunities that I am eager to pursue.”
The Indian Legal Program was established in 1988 to provide legal education and generate scholarship in the area of Indian law and to undertake public service to tribal governments. It trains students to effectively engage the representation of Native peoples and seeks to promote an understanding of the differences between the legal systems of Indian nations and those of the state and federal governments. The Program is among the most renowned of its kind, and its graduates work at all levels of tribal, state and federal government, as well as in private practice. The Program provides a unique set of academic and clinical opportunities for students and is committed to maintaining strong partnerships with American Indian nations and other native governments and organizations.
Lunch Lecture – George Skibine
“Perspective from 35 Years of Federal Service for Native Americans at the Department of the Interior”
George T. Skibine
Counsel, SNR Denton,
Washington, D.C.
Date: Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Time: 12:15 p.m.
Place: Armstrong Hall, College of Law, Room 114
Lunch will be provided so your RSVP is greatly appreciated!
RSVP/Contact: Kathy Tevis 480-965-2922 or kathy.tevis@asu.edu
Click here to download flyer!
