Alabama Law Celebrates the Class of 2025
On Sunday, May 4, The University of Alabama School of Law honored 162 graduates during its annual Commencement Ceremony at Coleman Coliseum. Chief Justice Sarah H. Stewart of the Supreme Court of Alabama gave the commencement address, and graduates Natalie Simon and Brandon Marsh offered their remarks as the valedictorian and SBA president, respectively. Read more about the ceremony here.
Announcing 2025 Alumni Award Recipients
The Law School is pleased to recognize the following alumni and faculty as recipients of the 2025 Alumni Awards:
Jerry W. Powell (Class of 1975) | Sam W. Pipes Distinguished Alumni Award
Professor Pamela Bucy Pierson | Alabama Lawyer Hall of Honor
Senator Jefferson B. Sessions III (Class of 1973) | Alabama Lawyer Hall of Honor
Chief Justice C.C. “Bo” Torbert Jr. (Class of 1954) | Alabama Lawyer Hall of Honor
H. Thomas “Tommy” Wells Jr. (Class of 1975) | Alabama Lawyer Hall of Honor
Judge Zachary R. Walden (Class of 2016) | Alabama Rising Young Attorney Award
The Alumni Society hosted a reception honoring Chief Justice C.C. “Bo” Torbert Jr. at Botanic in Opelika on May 15 – click here to view photos from the event.
The next alumni awards reception will be in Knoxville, Tennessee, on June 5 at The Maple Room to honor Judge Zachary Walden. On June 26, we will gather in Birmingham at The Wine Loft to honor Jerry Powell, Professor Pam Bucy Pierson, and Tommy Wells, and we will round out the summer in Mobile at Chuck’s Fish honoring Senator Jeff Sessions. We hope you will join us to celebrate the achievements of these outstanding members of the Alabama Law community. Click here for more information on each recipient and to RSVP to the receptions being held in their honor.
Become a Mentor to an Incoming 1L Student
The Law School’s Comprehensive Advising Program (CAP) ensures that our incoming students feel connected and supported throughout their time in law school. Through CAP, our 1L students are assigned four mentors—a faculty advisor, a student mentor, an alumni mentor, and a Career Services representative—each playing a pivotal role in helping our students succeed in the classroom and into their careers.
If you are interested in participating this fall as an alumni mentor in the CAP program and have not already signed up, please fill out the survey here. Our hope is for the alumni mentor and student mentee to create a relationship that will last throughout the student’s time in law school, and possibly beyond—a relationship that can help students learn about and navigate the law school experience, the practice of law, and specific legal markets. At a minimum, alumni mentors are asked to communicate with their mentee at least once per semester.
Don’t miss out on this rewarding experience. Sign up today to become an alumni mentor!
Contact Amber Brackett at abrackett@law.ua.edu for more information.
Gifts
Recognition of gifts of $5,000+ over the past month
Judy Whalen Evans (‘75) contributed $5,000 to the Alabama Law Alumni Society.
James W. Gewin (‘66) contributed $60,641 to the Judge Walter P. Gewin Memorial Endowed Scholarship.
The Estate of Shelley Jones contributed $200,000 to the Thomas L. Jones Endowed Scholarship.
Vice Dean Joel Nichols and Jenni Nichols pledged $5,000 to the Path Makers Legacy Plaza.
Dawn L. Oliver (‘00) pledged $5,000 to the Path Makers Legacy Plaza.
Benjamin C. Powell and Dean Daniel C. Powell (‘98) contributed $75,000 to the Caroline and Glenn Powell Memorial Endowed Law Scholarship in honor of their parents, C. Glenn and Caroline Powell.
Jerry W. Powell (‘75) and Carolyn W. Powell contributed $1,238,910 to the Jerry and Carolyn Powell Professor of Practice for Law and Business.
Navan Ward Jr. (‘02) pledged $5,000 to the Path Makers Legacy Plaza.
Winston & Strawn LLP contributed $5,000 to the Paula W. Hinton (‘79) and James F. Hinton (‘48) Scholarship in honor of Paula Hinton’s years of dedicated service as a partner of the firm.
The following alumni and friends (not mentioned above) either made or renewed an annual giving contribution to the Alabama Law Alumni Society this past month. Visit www.give.ua.edu to make or renew your contribution.
Johnathan L. Butler (‘00)
Abigail C. Castleberry (‘15)
L. Peyton Chapman III (‘96)
Patrick B. Collins (‘89)
Keith Covington (‘87)
Ann S. Crosby (‘78)
Samuel N. Crosby (‘78)
Ronald L. Davis (‘76)
Jill V. Deer (‘88)
Clausen Ely Jr. (‘72)
Ross Frazer (‘01)
Timothy Hoff
Thomas E. James (‘97)
Roy E. Long (‘69)
John N. Loupe (‘05)
Evelyn V. Mauldin (‘81)
Hon. Claud D. Neilson (‘66)
Patricia B. Rumore (‘75)
Samuel A. Rumore Jr. (‘75)
Halron W. Turner (‘84)
Albert J. Schibani (‘74)
Lowell A. Womack (‘66)
Class Notes
Hon. Tiffanie Agee (‘13) was appointed as district judge for the Tenth Judicial Circuit of Alabama in Jefferson County.
Robert Baugh (‘82) was inducted as a life fellow of the Birmingham Bar Foundation.
Hon. Benjamin Bowden (‘92) was appointed to the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals.
Greg Carwie (‘88) and Donald Johnson (‘96) were reelected to the board of directors at Dentons Sirote.
Gregory S. Curran (‘89) was named to Birmingham Business Journal’s 2025 Power 60 list.
W. Lee Elebash (‘05) joined Phelps as counsel in Pensacola, Florida.
Bruce P. Ely (‘80) was appointed as interim chair of the State Tax Advisory Board for Bloomberg Tax & Accounting.
Megan M. Everett (‘23) joined Butler Snow’s constitutional and civil rights litigation practice group as an attorney.
Donald M. Harrison III (‘01) was appointed by President Donald Trump as acting administrator of the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division.
Timothy A. Heisterhagen (‘09) joined Burr & Forman’s transportation, insurance, and product section practice group as counsel in Mobile.
Parker Jennings (‘24) joined Lightfoot, Franklin & White as an associate in Birmingham.
Katherine A. Kiziah (‘10) joined Rafferty Domnick Cunningham & Yaffa’s mass tort practice group as a partner in Palm Beach, Florida.
Glory McLaughlin (‘05) and Kari Todd (‘19) were selected for the 2025 cohort of the Nonprofit Executive Leadership Institute by the Alabama Association of Nonprofits.
Brian Pugh (‘99) opened The Pugh Firm in Mobile.
Kyle Smith (‘95) was reappointed as president of Dentons Sirote.
Crystal N. Smitherman (‘19) was appointed to national committee positions with the National League of Cities, including the Finance, Administration, and Intergovernmental Relations (FAIR) Committee, Women in Municipal Government Board of Directors, Large Cities Council, and Race Equity and Leadership Council (REAL).
Joseph A. Sowell III (‘81) announced his retirement from HCA Healthcare.
R. Scott Williams (‘88) was listed in Attorney Intel’s Top 25 Financial Services and Insurance Attorneys of 2025.
The following alumni were selected as Alabama Law Foundation Fellows for 2025:
Hon. Benjamin H. Brooks III (‘83)
Hon. C. Mark Erwin (‘98)
Christopher B. Estes (‘98)
Erby J. Fischer II (‘96)
T. Kent Garrett (‘79)
Wilson F. Green (‘94)
Hon. Harold V. Hughston Jr. (‘79)
Hon. Lloria Munnerlyn James (‘04)
James A. Rives (‘89)
Steven P. Savarese Jr. (‘06)
Lewis R. Shreve (‘11)
Ronald H. Strawbridge Sr. (‘67)
Aldos L. Vance (‘00)
Faculty Notes
Professor Bill Andreen served as an advisor on an Alabama Public Television video about the hazardous waste disposal landfill in Emelle, Alabama.
Professor L. Scott Coogler joined the FedArb panel as a neutral.
Professor Russell Gold’s article, Look What You Made Me Do, was accepted for publication in Washington & Lee Law Review. He also presented the article at the Markelloquium criminal theory colloquium and the Law and Society Association annual meeting. He presented another working paper at the Democracy Works-in-Progress conference.
Additionally, as part of his work with the University of Alabama’s Teaching Academy, he spearheaded a project in which law students partnered with Tuscaloosa’s Central High School to teach high school students about the search and seizure law being covered in Professor Gold’s Criminal Procedure course.
Professor Susan Pace Hamill commented on proposed grocery tax cuts in the state for an AL.com article. Additionally, her book, As Certain as Death: A Fifty-State Survey of State and Local Tax Laws, was featured in the investiture ceremony of Judge Beverly Luther Quast of the Minnesota Tax Court, who credited the book with sparking her love of tax law and policy.
Professor Paul Horwitz’s article, “I Love Beating George Washington,” reviewing Ethan J. Leib’s (Fordham Law School) article about fiduciary constitutionalism, Good Faith in U.S. Constitutional Law, was published on Jotwell. Horwitz is co-editor of Jotwell’s Constitutional Law section. He also commented on the definition of “sexually explicit” materials in regard to a First Amendment dispute involving Alabama libraries resisting book relocation demands in an AL.com article.
Professor JD Hsin commented on the effects that staffing cuts at the Office for Civil Rights in the Department of Education will have on special education students in a Honolulu Civil Beat article.
Professor Dan Joyner’s article, Economic Nationalism as the Fourth Era of International Trade Law, was published in Manchester Journal of International Economic Law. He also published an essay on the Trump administration’s tariffs entitled Trade Update: Navigating Trump Administration Tariffs – Reciprocal Tariffs and Further Developments (with James K. Kearney, Alan F. Enslen, David Vance Lucas, Robert A. Broadbent, Julius H. Bodie, Andrew Tuggle, Scott A. Jones, Angela Ennis, and John McCullough).
Professor Travis Ramey’s article, Wrongful Birth After Dobbs and the Limits of Tort Law in Areas of Dissensus, was published in Vol. 103 of Nebraska Law Review.
Professor Ken Rosen spoke at the Huntsville chapter of the Federalist Society on the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Professor Gary Sullivan was interviewed for a Bloomberg Law article about the newly enacted Alabama bankruptcy law that will likely affect Jackson Hospital in Montgomery.
Professor Sean Tu’s article, Differential Legal Protections for Biologics vs Small-Molecule Drugs in the US (with Olivier J. Wouters, Matthew Vogel, William B. Feldman, Reed F. Beall, and Aaron S. Kesselheim), was selected by AcademyHealth as the recipient of the 2025 Publication of the Year Award. He was also interviewed for a Hunterbrook article about the legal battle between pharma rivals Liquidia and United Therapeutics regarding the approval and release of Liquidia’s new pulmonary hypertension treatment drug, Yutrepia.