Dedication to Dean Alicia Ouellette.

AuthorLevine, Howard A.
PositionWrongful Convictions: Understanding and Addressing Criminal Injustice - Testimonial

I take this opportunity to commend Albany Law School's Trustees and faculty on their wisdom in choosing Alicia Ouellette as the school's new dean. I have known Dean Ouellette for some twenty-one years. In 1994 I interviewed her for a law clerk's position starting that fall. She was one of six finalists for a coveted appointment as law clerk to a judge of the New York Court of Appeals. (I was realistic in knowing at the time that the particular identity of the judge was not the primary attraction for the applicant.)

I went through a painstaking process in picking my law clerks. That meant sifting through resumes, comparing legal writing and editing experience, and closely reading writing samples to narrow the field to a manageable number of interviews. Alicia easily made the cut. She had an outstanding scholastic record at Albany Law School, where she was elected Editor-in-Chief of the Albany Law Review and had glowing recommendations from faculty members I knew and respected.

Next came the interview, which was critical, where I looked for the more subtle qualities of character, personal compatibility, and passion for the law in itself and as an instrument for achieving justice between the parties and the public good. In all these respects, I found Alicia to be as outstanding in person as she was on paper.

Alicia was a superb law clerk. Not only was she outstanding in performing the typical duties of a law clerk--research, drafting, and editing--but also she had an independence of mind, collegiality, and definite powers of persuasion. With these traits, she was able to make significant contributions to the work products of my and other judge's chambers. A notable example of Alicia's contributions through using those skills was the case of In re Jacob, (1) and its companion case of In re Dana. In Dana, the issue was whether the state's adoption statute could be given a sufficiently broad construction to permit the lesbian partner of the child's birth mother to convert her de facto parent status to a legal one through adoption. Alicia's tenacity and analytical skill ultimately persuaded me to switch my vote to create a majority in favor of the adoption. I am proud...

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