WCL's IP report shows concern about U.S.-Korea FTA restrictions
The final draft of the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement (FTA) awaits Congressional approval. However, the American University Washington College of Law's Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP) conducted a study on the impact of the Agreement. It submitted a report analyzing the U.S. Trade Representative's summary of the Korean FTA. In its report, PIJIP expressed its concerns on the provisions exerted by the new FTA pharmaceutical proposals. The proposed trade pact creates greater restrictions on the pharmaceutical sector than previous agreements. PIJIP feels the pact will thwart attempts to negotiate lower consumer drug prices in the U.S. and Korea. The new FTA also includes a chapter on pharmaceuticals that imposes rules on the reimbursement of drugs under Korea's national insurance. Its IP provisions exceed World Trade Organization (WTO) rules on patents and registration data. These rules have been designed to delay the entry of generic drugs into the Korean market. Though the actual provisions are still hazy, PIJIP Associate Director Sean Flynn feels the pact will restrict both governments from negotiating reduced prices through public drug formularies. Flynn also feels that "many of the provisions here will be greater than controversies surrounding the Australia's Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme included in the Australia-U.S. FTA." The PIJIP report also said that, although the Korea's FTA basically follows the same pattern, few additions and subtractions will further reduce the two countries' ability to use public drug formularies to negotiate lower prices. The new changes are: the inclusion of pharmaceutical reimbursement restrictions to "medical devices," "the commitment to increase access to innovative products," the absence of language on mandatory "transparency" provisions, and the creation of an independent review "body" for all of Korea's listing decisions.
Small Changes Lead to Reduced Crime Rate
Frank Zimring, distinguished scholar and professor at UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law, delivered his lecture, "The Crime Decline of the 1990s: Lessons for Policy and Science" at Vanderbilt Law School on April 9. His lecture studies the crime rate of the past half century and attempts to pinpoint the causes behind our current declining crime rate. The decline is a strange phenomenon that started in 1991 and continued on for nine consecutive years. Zimring noted, "There had never been at any recorded time in American crime statistics when we experienced nine consecutive years of declines in all types of crime, in all regions, in all kinds of demographic structures." Because this is an unprecedented event, it's imperative to find a satisfactory explanation for the trend. Zimring explored several possible factors, including heightening incarceration rates, the economic boom of the 1990s, a smaller youth population, declining drug use, and legalized abortion. The most interesting part of Zimring's study was the claim that there was a "cyclical phenomenon not attributable to any measurable instrumental causes." Basically, all of Zimring's research supports the idea that there doesn't need to be major social changes to reduce crime. He added, "The essential lesson for policy, which is important and optimistic, is that we don't have to change the world we live in much to make it a great deal safer in the streets. If that's all we've learned, we've learned an awful lot that's important."
Bernstine named new CEO & president of Law School Admission Council
The President of Portland State University (PSU), Daniel O. Bernstine will be the new President and Chief Executive Officer of the Pennsylvania-based Law School Admission Council (LSAC), effective July 1, 2007. He will replace the retiring president, Philip D. Shelton, who will leave LSAC after 14 years. Bernstine was President of the state university for the last decade. Prior to that, he was Dean of the University of Wisconsin Law School from 1990 to 1997. Bernstine is an attorney and an expert on courts and higher education. He has authored three books and numerous scholarly articles. He has vast experience in drafting and reviewing test questions while successfully leading the National Conference of Bar Examiners. Bernstine's "wisdom about undergraduate education, law schools, and the practicing bar" and his qualifications as a successful "manager and academic leader" will help LSAC stride ahead, said Kent Syverud, Chair of the LSAC Board of Trustees. As for Bernstine, he summed up his move as "a good opportunity […] to do something different." From being the son of a former janitor and sharecropper, Bernstine climbed up the academic ladder to become Dean of the University of Wisconsin Law School in 1990. He has also had his share of praise and criticism as president of Oregon's largest state university. Bernstine, adulated as an avant-garde fundraiser who has brought more dollars into PSU than ever before, is also criticized for making the university lose focus by being "too many things to too many people". Headquartered in Newtown, Pennsylvania, the LSAC administers the Law School Admission Test (LSAT) and carries out multiple other services for law schools and students. The members of LSAC, a non-profit organization, include law schools across the United States and Canada. Apart from encouraging students from the underrepresented groups to take up the legal profession, LSAC also funds wide-ranging social science research on l aw and legal institutions.
Evaluating Parental Leave Policies
Saul Levmore, Dean of the University of Chicago Law School, will pay a visit to Case Western Reserve University School of Law to speak about "Parental Leave and Other Embarrassments" at the Sumner Canary Lecture on Tuesday, April 17. Levmore will focus his lecture on current parental leave policies and the adoption of universal extended paid parental leave. He will explore the sustainability of current parental leave policies and different tactics on improving our current child care policies. Currently, the U.S. has one of the worst parental leave policies in the world. Levmore said, "It is not simply that we choose to have less of a welfare state. Many developing nations offer little in the way of safety nets, but much more than our laws do for the typical employee occupied with childbirth. "The right to parental leave is new to American workers; it covers one-half of the private sector workforce and is relatively short and unpaid. By contrast, other nations offer universal, paid leaves of 10 months or more." Levmore, one of today's most respected scholars, is a modern day renaissance man. In addition to authoring a book on games and puzzles, Levmore has also written on public choice, obesity regulation, deception, and disaster relief. He was also a visiting professor at Yale, Harvard, Michigan, Northwestern, and Chicago law schools.
Can an accused waive trial and sentencing by asking for death sentence?
In a unique twist, Marco Allen Chapman asked the court for a death sentence. He is accused of the murder of two children, the attempted murder of their sister, and the rape and attempted murder of their mother. The Kentucky Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether a defendant can surrender his rights and ask for execution. Ironically, the case brings the prosecutor and the defendant on the same side. Chapman's court-appointed lawyers Donna Boyce and Randall Wheeler contend that the trial judge mishandled the case. They also assert that the depressed Chapman was using the law to commit suicide. They asked for Chapman to be treated for depression, after which a new hearing could be ordered. The prosecutors argued that since Chapman was found competent a number of times, his plea should be allowed. This case, however, is not new occurrence. According to the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, 124 inmates in 26 out of 38 states which allow death-penalty have waived their appeals and requested a death sentence.
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