College of Law students win national moot court competition

College of Law students win national moot court competitionFebruary 28, 2006Jaclyn D. Grossojgrosso@law.syr.edu

The Syracuse University College of Law Outlaw Moot Court Team won the Second Annual National Sexual Orientation Law Moot Court Competition Feb. 24 at the UCLA School of Law.

The three-member team argued questions that dealt with the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the Full Faith and Credit Clause and the Fundamental Right to Marry, and defeated a team from the University of California at Davis. The competition took place before an audience of legal scholars and professionals from across the country who were attending UCLA’s Williams Project Update on issues involving sexual orientation and the law.

The winning SU team consisted of second-year students Kristin Mikolaitis and Joshua Boudreaux and first-year student Olatokunbo Olaniyan, who argued their case before the Hon. Steven H. Levinson, associate justice of the Hawaii Supreme Court. Judge Levinson is the author of Baehr v. Lewin, the first case that recognized a fundamental right to marry for same sex couples.

“This competition is a unique and valuable experience for students to test their knowledge of the issues surrounding sexual orientation and the law,” says adjunct professor and coach Charles “Casey” M. Sprock Jr., who is also an attorney at the Syracuse firm of Baldwin & Sutphen LLP. “Their strong legal skills impressed some of the leading authorities in our profession.”

Other participating law schools included Cornell University, New York University, the University of Connecticut, the University of Southern California and George Washington University. The SU team was sponsored by the College Of Law’s Student Senate and SU’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Resource Center.