International students draw legal comparisons

Wryly titled “A Comparative, Brief, and Incomplete Introduction to the Law and Legal System of the United States,” the Nov. 16 program drew two dozen attendees, including several undergraduates, as part of International Education Week at the University.

The event came in two parts: a PowerPoint presentation by five LL.M. students about the U.S. legal system and those of their home countries, and a discussion by two members of the Law School’s Women, Children, and Social Justice Clinic on a U.S. domestic violence case that progressed to an international human rights court.

The Law School’s LL.M. program is designed for practicing lawyers who hold a law degree from a non-U.S. country and wish to broaden their skills and knowledge by learning more about the U.S. legal system. It’s a growing edge for SUNY Buffalo Law, which is seeking to grow its international enrollment.

Brenda Cisneros Vilchis began the program by comparing the U.S. and Mexican constitutions, noting that the president of Mexico is elected by popular vote and serves a single six-year term, and that the country’s high court, the Supreme Court of Justice, has 11 ministers.

Harshavardhan Raja, an Indian national who earned his law degree in Australia, detailed the federal and state courts in the United States, and noted that the Australian government includes both the queen and the governor general – honorary titles as compared to to the real power held by the prime minister. The prime minister, he said, is chosen by the members of the party that holds the majority of seats in the House of Representatives.

Colombian student Blanca Owen differentiated between the civil law system, used in most of the world, and the common law system, the basis of the U.S. legal system. In the United States’ case law system, she noted, “When a judge decides a case, he resolves a controversy and also creates a precedent which has legal effect in the future.” In Colombia’s jurisprudence system, by contrast, only the decisions of the Constitutional Court and Supreme Court’s Appellate Division are binding; decisions of other courts are only considered “highly persuasive.”

Habriel Mykula, a student from Ukraine, spoke on pre-trial civil procedure. In Ukraine’s civil system, he said, the judge manages the litigation from its inception and the litigants don’t have the unlimited ability to settle the case. The civil system, he said, also regulates the time frame in which the case is decided.

Finally, Jeeah Kim from South Korea spoke about responses to domestic violence in her nation and in the United States. In the patriarchal culture of South Korea, she said, “The man is the head of the family. The woman is considered chattel or property. … Domestic violence is treated as a private problem. Police usually do not respond, and when they do, arrests are rarely made. In the United States, the government takes a more active role in helping victims of domestic violence.” She cited the New York State Integrated Domestic Violence Court, in which a single judge addresses a multiplicity of problems in a troubled family.

In the second part of the program, clinical students Amanda Sullivan and Olegbemisola Aregbesola detailed another point of intersection between U.S. and international law: the case of Jessica Gonzalez of Castle Rock, Colo. Gonzalez was divorcing her husband, Simon, and obtained a restraining order against him because of past erratic behavior. When their three young daughters went missing, she notified the police repeatedly. Meanwhile, Simon Gonzalez bought a gun, went to the local police station and opened fire. After he was killed, police found the bodies of the three girls in his truck.

In a case that went to the U.S. Supreme Court, the justices ruled that police have no mandatory duty to enforce restraining orders. Gonzalez’s legal team, the presenters said, took her case to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an organ of the Organization of American States. The commission found that the United States had violated the fundamental human rights of Jessica Gonzalez and her daughters, and stated unequivocally that freedom from domestic violence is a fundamental human right.

Sullivan and Aregbesola said the Women, Children, and Social Justice Clinic has joined other law clinics across the nation, including those in Baltimore, Cincinnati and Albany, to bring this proclamation to their local governments. On Nov. 9, they said, representatives of the SUNY Buffalo Law clinic presented Erie County legislators with a resolution to recognize freedom from domestic violence as a fundamental human right.

Says Joseph Schneider, director of Post-Professional and International Education in the Law School, “We wanted to give the LL.M. students an opportunity to share with a larger audience their knowledge of both the law and legal system of the United States and those of the countries where they received their initial legal education. The law school is fortunate to have lawyers from many countries as students in the LL.M. program, and events like this one give members of the law school and university community the opportunity to benefit from their presence. As international enrollment in the law school grows, we will continue to have exciting opportunities to bring domestic students together with legal professionals from all over the world.”

The program was followed by the universal language of food – a buffet of Ethiopian and Thai cuisine.