Society, Law & Politics

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the U.S. Supreme Court will give the keynote address at the University of Colorado Law School’s Gathering of the Bench and Bar Conference to be held Sept. 19-21 in Boulder.

Michael Radelet , professor of sociology, is an expert on the use of the death penalty in Colorado and the United States. He has documented all of Colorado’s executions and notes that Colorado abolished the penalty between 1897 and 1901, came within one vote of abolishing it again in 2009 and has executed only one person since 1967. “We've always debated the death penalty in Colorado, and the general thrust of our history is in the direction of abolition,” he said.

Kenneth Foote , professor of geography, studies how events of violence and tragedy are memorialized and remembered. He has visited hundreds of sites that have been scarred by incidents of violence or tragedy in the United States and abroad, and is the author of the book “Shadowed Ground: America’s Landscapes of Violence and Tragedy.” He can be reached at kfoote@colorado.edu or 303-641-3346.

The University of Colorado Law School on June 6-8 will host the Natural Resources Law Center’s 2012 Martz Summer Conference, “A Low-Carbon Energy Blueprint for the American West” in the Wolf Law Building. Former Gov. Bill Ritter, executive director of the Center for the New Energy Economy, will be the keynote speaker. Ritter’s keynote address will provide an overview of the trends and future of energy in the upcoming decades.

Leeds School of Business news release A graduate team from the University of Colorado Boulder has won the 15th International Venture Capital Investment Competition, or VCIC, the premiere educational event for venture capital and entrepreneurship.

University of Colorado Boulder students, along with experts from government and industry, will focus on student research and the natural gas boom during the third annual Energy Frontiers conference April 5. The event, organized by the CU Energy Club, is free and open to the public and will be held from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in the Glenn Miller Ballroom of the University Memorial Center. The conference includes a poster session, panel discussion, catered lunch and a career fair.

Ten high school students from Denver, Thornton and Lyons are likely in for an experience of a lifetime when a University of Colorado Boulder law professor takes them to Washington, D.C., for a moot court competition March 29-April 1. While there, they also will meet with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor and tour the Supreme Court, meet with U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette of Colorado and tour the Capitol, in addition to visiting several national monuments and museums.

Richard Collins, professor of law at the CU-Boulder Law School, is an expert in constitutional law. He can be reached at 303-492-5493 or Richard.collins@colorado.edu .

Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens will present the inaugural Stevens Lecture, a new series of talks named for him, at the University of Colorado Law School at 5 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 22.