Clinical Law Program Faculty
Kim Ambrose
Acting Director and Supervising Attorney, Children and Youth Advocacy Clinic
Senior Lecturer
Kim Ambrose is a lecturer and supervising attorney for CAYAC. Before coming to the clinic, she helped create and direct the Immigrant Child Advocacy Project through Seattle University Law School's Access to Justice Institute. She spent several years as a public defender representing indigent adults and juveniles in both child welfare and criminal proceedings. After graduating from the University of Washington Law School in 1989, Ms. Ambrose clerked for U.S. District Judge David Ezra in the District of Hawaii. She has also worked as a resource attorney for the Washington Defender Association, providing training, technical assistance and resources to public defense attorneys around Washington State.
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Molly Cohan
Supervising Attorney, Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic
Lecturer
Molly M. Cohan is the Supervising Attorney for the Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic at the University of Washington School of Law. She has extensive experience in criminal law with particular interest in training, cultural competence, and tribal criminal defense. Ms. Cohan worked at The Defender Association in Seattle for 27 years in a variety of staff and supervisory positions. She has practiced in the areas of misdemeanors, felonies, juvenile, BECCA, and dependencies. Molly has also done pro bono work with Navajo Public Defender and in Chehalis and Suquamish Tribal Courts. Immediately prior to coming to the Law School, she was the Training Coordinator for the Washington Defender Association.
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Bill Covington
Director, Technology Law & Public Policy Clinic
Assistant Professor of Law
Bill Covington began his legal career at Evergreen Legal Services in Seattle. After moving to King County government, he crafted the first county-wide master cable television ordinance, oversaw utility permitting and developed telecommunications policies. Covington's legal experience includes service as principal, corporate counsel and regional counsel for several telecommunications companies. His functions involved drafting telecommunications and land use legislation for municipalities, legislative relations, provider service applications, franchising, leasing and telecommunications tax policy matters.
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Signe Dortch
Director, Immigration Law Clinic
Part-time Lecturer
An alumna of the UW Immigration Law Clinic, Signe Dortch has dedicated her legal career to defending immigrants and refugees. She worked as a staff attorney at the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project from 1999 until 2002, representing immigrant survivors of domestic violence. From 2002 to 2007, she worked as an associate attorney at Gibbs Houston Pauw. There, Professor Dortch represented clients in removal proceedings before the Immigration Court and in appeals to the Board of Immigration Appeals and the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. She also represented clients in filing affirmative applications with the Department of Homeland Security. Professor Dortch has presented at many immigration conferences on, among other topics, immigration options for battered immigrants, asylum law, and relief for long-time lawful permanent residents facing removal from the U.S.
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Gillian Dutton
Director, Refugee & Immigration Advocacy Clinic
Part-time Lecturer
Jill Dutton is a staff attorney for the Northwest Justice Project. She works on issues such as prenatal care for undocumented women, immigrant access to managed care, the provision of bilingual services to clients with limited English language skills, and naturalization for persons with disabilities. Dutton is a recipient of the 1999 Charles A. Goldmark Award for Distinguished Service and the 2005 Golden Door Award presented by the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project.
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Carrie Gargas
Supervising Attorney, Unemployment Compensation Law Clinic
Part-time Lecturer
A UWLS alum and part-time Lecturer, Carrie’s background includes clerking for the Argentine Supreme Court, serving as a Goldmark Fellow at the Northwest Justice Project, representing low-income clients at the Seattle Community Law Center and the Snohomish County Public Defenders office, supervising Seattle University’s Unemployment Benefits for Battered Women Project and managing the Community Justice Centers of the Seattle University Access to Justice Institute.
Julia Ann Gold
Director, Mediation Clinic
Senior Lecturer in Law
Julia Ann Gold teaches the Mediation Clinic, the Mediation Skills CLE program, Negotiation and Street Law. She is active in offering mediation and conflict resolution training nationally. Prior to joining the UW faculty in 1995, she founded and directed the Mediation Clinic at the University of Oregon School of Law. Gold’s mediation practice includes civil cases, employment, consumer and small business mediations, community and neighborhood mediation, small claims, landlord-tenant mediation, and family conflicts. She is a member of the ADR Roundtable and serves on the Board of the King County Dispute Resolution Center. She also co-chairs the annual Northwest Dispute Resolution Conference.
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Lisa Kelly
Director, Children and Youth Advocacy Clinic
Associate Dean,
Bobbe & Jonathan Bridge Professorship in Children and Family Advocacy
Professor of Law
Before she accepted her current position, Lisa Kelly was a professor at University of West Virginia Law School, where she had been a member of the faculty since 1992. Prior to entering teaching, she practiced civil rights and employment law in Arkansas, where she handled complex litigation. She has has taught courses in children and the law, education law, family law, race and the American legal process, torts and trial advocacy. She is the author of several articles, and in 1996, received the AALS scholarly paper award for junior faculty.
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Alan Kirtley
Mediation Clinic
Associate Professor of Law
Alan Kirtley is the founder of the Clinical Law Program. Before entering law teaching Kirtley was a partner in a Michigan law firm. His practice specialty was business law and commercial litigation. He teaches courses in alternative dispute resolution (ADR) and negotiations, and supervises student practice in the School's Mediation Clinic. He was a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Law School in the fall of 1998, and Ohio State University College of Law the summer of 2000. Kirtley has a private mediation practice, and conducts trainings in both negotiation and mediation. He is a frequent presenter in ADR meetings and conferences. Kirtley has served as Chair (1992-93) of the ADR Section of the Washington State Bar Association. He has published several articles in the ADR field, including an article concerning mediation privilege statutes that won first prize in the 1995 CPR Institute for Dispute Resolution Awards for Excellence in Alternative Dispute Resolution.
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Deborah Maranville
Director, Clinical Law Program
Director, Unemployment Compensation Clinic
Professor of Law
Debbie Maranville joined the UW law school faculty in 1989 to help develop the clinical law program. She directs the Unemployment Compensation Clinic and teaches Civil Procedure and Access to Justice Seminar. She has also taught Feminist Legal Theory. She has been a member of the Board of Editors of the Clinical Law Review and has chaired the Executive Committees of the American Association of Law Schools Poverty Law and Teaching Methods Sections. Locally, she has chaired the King County Bar Association's Gender Equality in the Legal Profession Committee. She has been an active volunteer with the Northwest Women's Law Center.
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Jackie McMurtrie
Director, Innocence Project Northwest
Associate Professor of Law
Jackie McMurtrie teaches criminal law and previously directed the school’s Criminal Law Clinic. Before joining the law school faculty in 1989, she worked as a staff attorney and supervising attorney for the Seattle-King County Public Defender Association. McMurtrie has been a visiting professor at Seattle University School of Law. She has been recognized as a Superlawyer and received numerous award for her teaching and work with Innocence Project Northwest.
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Katie Meyer
Program Director, Entrepreneurial Law Clinic
Katie Meyer received her JD from University of Washington School of Law in 2006 and is a member of the Washington Stae Bar. She helped to found the ELC during her third year of law school and has been directing the program ever since. She has experience in fundraising, program management and entrepreneurship.
Sean O'Connor
Director, Entrepreneurial Law Clinic
Associate Professor of Law
Sean O’Connor is Associate Director of the Center for Advanced Study and Research on Intellectual Property. He also serves as Associate Director of the Intellectual Property Law and Policy Program. He teaches courses in intellectual property, biotechnology, business and securities law. Prior to joining the UW Law School faculty, he was a faculty member at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. Before entering academia, O’Connor was in private practice with Hale and Dorr in Boston and Weil, Gotshal & Manges in New York.
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Michael Robinson-Dorn
Director, Berman Environmental Law Clinic
Assistant Professor of Law
In addition to teaching in the School of Law’s Environmental Law Program, Professor Robinson-Dorn also teaches Administrative Law. An honor’s graduate of Cornell Law School, Prof. Robinson-Dorn has extensive litigation experience in both the private and public sectors. Prior to entering academia, he directed the City of Seattle's Environmental Protection Section, was a principal with a Seattle-based law firm, served as a trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, Environment and Natural Resources Division, and worked at Jones Day in Washington, D.C., where he first focused on natural resources and environmental matters. In addition, Prof. Robinson-Dorn served as a law clerk to U.S. District Court Judge Morton A. Brody.
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Scott Schumacher
Director, Federal Tax Clinic
Assistant Professor
of Law
In addition to the clinic, Scott Schumacher teaches courses in the Graduate Tax Program. He was previously an attorney with Chicoine & Hallett, P.S., in Seattle, Washington, where his practice focused on tax controversy and litigation. He also served as a trial attorney with the United States Department of Justice Tax Division, and was an attorney-advisor to the Honorable Arthur L. Nims III, Chief Judge of the United States Tax Court.
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Cynthia Tompkins
Staff Attorney, Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic
Cynthia Tomkins is the Tribal Court Public Defender Clinic’s inaugural Legal Fellow. She was enrolled in the clinic during her second year in law school, and continued her work as a clinic summer intern during her second and third year summers. A 2006 graduate of the Law School, with a concentration in Environmental Law, she was a finalist in the 2005 Environmental Law Appellate Moot Court Competition. She did externships with American Rivers and the Land Use Division of the Seattle City Attorney’s Office. She is a certified mediator. Before attending law school, she worked as an accounting supervisor, and an operations manager for two local businesses.
Ms. Tomkins is admitted to practice in the Tulalip, Port Gamble, and Squaxin Island Tribal Courts and State of Washington.
Ron Whitener
Director, Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic
Assistant Professor
of Law
Prior to the creation of the Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic, Ron Whitener taught the Indian Law Clinic at the University of Washington School of Law from 1999-2002. He has worked as a staff attorney at the Northwest Justice Project’s Native American Unit, representing low-income Native American clients with civil and criminal law issues. Ron is also a member of the Squaxin Island Tribe, where he served six years as tribal attorney.
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