FIEGER'S $4 MILLION GIFT TO LAW COLLEGE AT MSU ESTABLISHES NATION'S FIRST TRIAL PRACTICE INSTITUTE FOR LAW STUDENTS

11/27/2001

EAST LANSING, Mich. - One of the nation's most prominent practicing trial lawyers has partnered with the law college at Michigan State University to establish the first trial practice institute at a law school designed specifically to train law students as successful trial lawyers.

Attorney Geoffrey N. Fieger has made a gift of $4 million to Michigan State University-Detroit College of Law (MSU-DCL) to initiate and sustain the Geoffrey Fieger Trial Practice Institute. The range of initiatives offered by the institute is a comprehensive set of programs aimed at bridging the law school experience with the practice of trial law in real-world settings.

Fieger graduated from the Detroit College of Law - now known as MSU-DCL - in 1979. His $4 million gift is the single largest donation in the law college's history.

"Michigan State University is a great institution," Fieger said, "and the law college gave me the education I needed as a foundation to represent my clients successfully in the courtroom. I feel it is the calling of trial lawyers to champion noble causes, as well as the forgotten and the damned.

"The foundation of our American legal system depends on the right of individuals to have their day in court, to have their cases judged by juries of their peers," he said. "I have teamed with MSU-DCL to create this institute to ensure that the art of advocacy - champions battling in a courtroom - is not lost. Our institute shall be dedicated to training effective and winning advocates for justice."

"MSU-DCL is very proud of Mr. Fieger's accomplishments as one of the law school's most prominent alumni," said Terence L. Blackburn, dean and professor of law at MSU-DCL. "We are honored to receive his support and pleased to have the trial practice institute named for him.

"Mr. Fieger is arguably the most preeminent trial lawyer in the country, and he is an inspiration to our students," Blackburn said. "It is Mr. Fieger's dedication to his clients, his thorough preparation for each case and his skill in the courtroom that serve as a model for this institute."

The Geoffrey Fieger Trial Practice Institute has the following components:

• a rigorous, comprehensive two-year curriculum - designed in collaboration with practicing trial lawyers and judges - featuring required and elective courses related to pretrial and trial skills.
• a certificate for students successfully completing the program.
• a selective admissions process that admits students based on their potential for successful trial advocacy, rather than academic performance as the sole criterion.
• a scholarship program that awards tuition grants to the most promising students.
• an annual lecture series that showcases nationally known trial lawyers with Fieger presenting the inaugural lecture in fall 2002.
• hands-on learning and practice-based experiences through clinics, externships, field placements and simulations.
• the law college's moot court room, a high-tech trial courtroom used for teaching, competitions, Michigan and federal court sessions, and special presentations.
• national and international trial advocacy and moot court competition teams.
• interdisciplinary learning opportunities.
• an advisory board, made up of practicing trial attorneys, including Fieger; judges; and law college faculty.

Sixteen second-year MSU-DCL law students were admitted preliminarily this fall to the institute. Interested students may now interview at the end of their first year of law school, and after a rigorous selection process, accepted students start the program at the beginning of their second year.

A unique aspect of the certificate program is a collaboration with other MSU programs. The theatre department will offer training in courtroom demeanor, and students will attend autopsies and learn about forensic science through the College of Human Medicine. Students also will be involved in a personal psychological study to better understand and empathize with the jury, judge and opposition.

"Good trial lawyers must understand human experience and, above all else, know themselves," Fieger said.

"This gift recognizes the historic special strengths of MSU-DCL and surely will build upon and advance those strengths," said MSU President Peter McPherson. "The gift offers students a unique way to blend education with skill, theory with application and the classroom with the courtroom."

"We believe this institute will become the country's preeminent trial practice program for law students," said MSU-DCL Board of Trustees President Clif Haley. "The financial support of alumni such as Geoffrey Fieger is essential to this mission and further enhancing the academic programs at MSU-DCL."

MSU-DCL plans to announce and showcase the trial practice institute to prospective law students from around the nation, building on Fieger's reputation as one of the nation's most successful trial attorneys. In addition, Fieger will present MSU-DCL's commencement address in June 2002.

Fieger, a Detroit native, practices law throughout the United States from the firm of Fieger, Fieger, Kenney & Johnson, P.C. in Southfield, Mich. The firm was founded by Fieger's father, the late Bernard J. Fieger.

Geoffrey Fieger has been described as a "champion of the people," and he credits his parents' social activism and concern for instilling in him a deep commitment to equality and fairness.

"I am motivated by compassion for individuals - men, women and children - whose constitutional freedoms are threatened," Fieger said. "To me, patriots are those who hold the principles upon which this nation was founded near and dear to their hearts.

"That may mean taking a position that is unpopular or speaking out when it would be more comfortable and politically advantageous to remain silent," he said. "I'm not afraid to speak out. I consider it my duty."

Fieger's practice areas include litigation, medical and professional malpractice, negligence law, personal injury, products liability and class actions. He has won more multimillion dollar verdicts for his clients than any other U.S. attorney.

He is one of a few civil trial lawyers who are also experienced criminal defense attorneys. For nearly 10 years, Fieger served as Jack Kevorkian's trial attorney, advocating the position that the government should not interfere with a mentally competent individual's freedom of choice.

In addition to his law degree from MSU-DCL, Fieger earned bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Michigan.

MSU-DCL, formerly known as Detroit College of Law, was founded in 1891 and was the first law school in Detroit. To extend its commitment to educational excellence, the Detroit College of Law affiliated with Michigan State University in 1995 and moved to MSU's East Lansing campus in 1997.

The move to MSU enabled the law college to build a $28 million facility and provide law students the benefits of a Big Ten university while maintaining its private school status. Today, MSU-DCL remains the nation's oldest continuously operating independent law school.