Attorney, Arguedas, Cassman & Headley, LLP
Ms. Arguedas is recognized as one of the finest criminal defense lawyers in the United States. In her 20-plus years in private practice, she has represented high-profile clients in some of the most visible cases around the country, as well as many little-known clients on relatively routine matters that never make the nightly news.
Ms. Arguedas is equally adept at handling complex white-collar cases, sensational murders, and the full range of less serious criminal cases. She works closely with other ACH lawyers as well as a team of investigators, jury consultants and other top experts she has assembled over more than two decades.
Singled out for her thorough preparation, shrewd strategizing, and impressive courtroom skills, Cris has been named the lawyer other lawyers would hire if they got arrested (California Lawyer), one of the 10 best lawyers in the Bay Area (San Francisco Chronicle, Northern California Super Lawyers), one of the 50 most influential women lawyers in the United States (National Law Journal), one of the 100 top lawyers in California (San Francisco Daily Journal, The Recorder), and one of the five most promising women lawyers in the country (Time). She was named to “The International Who’s Who of Business Crime Lawyers 2010”, is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, and in 2010 was inducted into the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame of the Litigation Section of the State Bar of California (an honor shared by only 20 other attorneys in the State).
Ms. Arguedas expertise also makes her a highly sought-after lecturer, teacher, and advisor to public officials in both major parties. She has served on advisory committees for the District Attorney of San Francisco and for the current and two past United States Attorneys for the Northern District of California. At the statewide level, she has been appointed to several commissions on judicial standards by the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court. Cris has also headed U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer’s Federal Judicial Selection Committee, which recommends nominees for the federal judiciary and for the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California.
Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division, The United States Department of Justice
Leslie R. Caldwell was confirmed as the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division on May 15, 2014.
As head of the Criminal Division, Ms. Caldwell oversees nearly 600 attorneys who prosecute federal criminal cases across the country, help develop criminal law and formulate criminal enforcement policy. She also works closely with the nation’s 93 United States Attorneys in the investigation and prosecution of criminal matters in their districts.
Ms. Caldwell has dedicated most of her professional career to handling federal criminal cases, both as a prosecutor and as defense counsel. From 2002 to 2004, Ms. Caldwell served as the director of the Justice Department’s Enron Task Force. When she worked at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California from 1999 to 2002, she served as the Chief of the Criminal Division and the Chief of the Securities Fraud Section. During her eleven years in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York from 1987 to 1998, her positions included Senior Trial Counsel for the Business & Securities Fraud Section and Chief of the Violent Criminal Enterprises Section. For her work on the Enron Task Force, Ms. Caldwell received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service. She is also the recipient of the Attorney General’s John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation and the Attorney General’s Award for Fraud Prevention.
Prior to joining the Criminal Division, Ms. Caldwell was a partner at Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP, a position she held since 2004. From 2004 to 2009, Ms. Caldwell was co-chair of the firm’s Corporate Investigations and White Collar Practice Group.
Ms. Caldwell received a B.A. in Economics from Pennsylvania State University and a J.D. from the George Washington University Law School.
Partner, McGuireWoods
Mr. Hatch is a partner in the firm’s Government Investigations and White Collar Litigation group. Prior to joining McGuireWoods, Mr. Hatch spent nine years as a federal prosecutor with the United States Attorney’s Office, serving in the Alexandria, Richmond and Norfolk divisions of the Eastern District of Virginia. Most recently, Ben served as the Managing Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) and Criminal Chief in the Norfolk Division.
During his time as an AUSA, Mr. Hatch successfully argued nine appeals in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and conducted thirteen jury trials and two bench trials in the Norfolk, Alexandria and Richmond Divisions.
Mr. Hatch's work involved a diverse array of criminal cases, including prosecuting complex national security matters, white collar, public corruption and violent crime. Mr. Hatch received The John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation, one of the highest awards given for trial practice by the Department of Justice, from then Attorney General Eric Holder for his role in a two month trial of several Somali pirates.
Mr. Hatch previously served as a law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court of the United States and Judge J. Michael Luttig of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. He graduated magna cum laude from the Harvard Law School. At Harvard, Mr. Hatch served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He was also part of a team that won Harvard Law School's Ames Moot Court Competition, and Ben received the George Leisure Award for being recognized as the best oralist.
For the last six years, Mr. Hatch has served as an Adjunct Professor teaching the Advanced Brief Writing class at the College of William and Mary Marshall-Wythe School of Law.
Partner, King & Spalding
John Richter is a trial and investigations partner in the Special Matters and Investigations Practice Group, and represents and defends companies, Boards of Directors, Board committees, and individuals facing a variety of white-collar criminal and regulatory enforcement matters, parallel civil litigation, and internal corporate investigations. John previously served as the Acting Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division at the U.S. Department of Justice and as the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma, having been nominated by President George W. Bush and confirmed by unanimous consent of the U.S. Senate.
Partner, Goodwin Procter LLP
Joseph Savage, a partner in Goodwin's Securities Litigation & White Collar Defense Group, concentrates his practice on white collar criminal defense, governmental investigations work and complex civil litigation. His practice involves representing individuals and companies in a wide variety of fraud, false claims act, securities, health care, tax, public corruption, environmental and other investigations by federal, state and local law enforcement and government regulators, as well as representing companies and individuals in civil litigation, especially complex commercial disputes.
With more than 30 years’ experience, Mr. Savage is one of the most widely respected and accomplished trial lawyers in the nation. He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and is annually recognized by Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business and U.S. News-Best Lawyers, which named him Boston white collar “Lawyer of the Year” for 2017.
Freelance Journalist and Author
Stuart Taylor, Jr. is a Washington writer focusing on legal and policy issues and a National Journal contributing editor. He occasionally practices law.
Taylor has coauthored three books. All have been acclaimed by commentators across the ideological spectrum. In January 2017, KC Johnson and Taylor authored The Campus Rape Frenzy: The Attack on Due Process at America's Universities. In 2012, Richard Sander and Taylor authored Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It's Intended to Help, and Why Universities Won't Admit It. In 2007, Taylor and Johnson authored Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Fraud. Sander and Taylor have also filed amicus briefs in Supreme Court cases involving admissions preferences.
Since 1980, Taylor has done reporting and commentary about issues ranging from the biggest Supreme Court cases to race, voting rights, mindlessly excessive criminal penalties, guilt-presuming campus rape processes, journalistic bias, the death penalty, war powers, gerrymandering, guns, polarization, civil liberties, national security, torture, campaign finance, education, impeachment, and other issues. He has often been called one of the nation's best legal journalists and is known for challenging both liberal and conservative conventional wisdom.
Taylor was a reporter for The New York Times from 1980-1988, covering legal affairs and then the Supreme Court. He wrote commentaries and long features for The American Lawyer, Legal Times and their affiliates from 1989-1997, and for National Journal and Newsweek from 1998 through 2010. He has written (less often) on a freelance basis for numerous publications since 2010. He has written op-eds for The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and The New York Daily News and longer commentaries for RealClearPolitics, The Atlantic, The New Republic, the (late) Weekly Standard, National Review, Slate, The Daily Beast, Harper’s, Reader’s Digest, Time and other magazines. He has been interviewed on all major television and radio networks. He taught “Law and the News Media” at Stanford Law School in 2011 and 2012 and practices law on occasion.
Taylor graduated from Princeton University in 1970 with an A.B. in History. After working as a reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun and Sun from 1971-1974, he moved to Harvard Law School, was a Harvard Law Review note editor, and graduated in 1977 at the top of his class, with high honors. He also won a Frederick Sheldon Traveling Fellowship and traveled around the world in 1977-1978 while studying freedom of the press in the United Kingdom and Kenya.
Taylor practiced law with Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, in Washington, D.C., from 1977-1980 before returning to journalism in 1980 by joining the Washington Bureau of The New York Times.
Taylor's journalism honors include the 2009 Northern California Innocence Project Media Award for his work on the Duke lacrosse rape fraud; a 2002 National Headliner Award for best special magazine column on one subject; and a share of The American Lawyer’s National Magazine Award for a March 1990 special issue on the drug war. He was a National Magazine Award finalist in 1993 and 1997 and was nominated by The New York Times for a Pulitzer Prize in 1988.
Associate Justice, North Carolina Supreme Court
Early Years
Personal Information
Married to Susan Awbrey Hunter. One son, Robert Neal Hunter III; two step-sons, Chris Awbrey Steele and Alan Baret Steel; two grandchildren; Member of First Presbyterian Church, Greensboro, North Carolina
Partner, Robinson & Lawing, LLP
When Mike Robinson was six years old, he wrote a brief essay in school about what he wanted to be when he grew up. While the other kids in his class wanted to be firemen, cowboys, ballerinas and football players, Mike knew he wanted to be a lawyer and one day a judge. Since that time, he never wavered from those goals. Today, Mike has a distinguished law career and recently announced his candidacy for the Supreme Court of North Carolina.
For over 33 years, Mike has practiced law in North Carolina. In 1997, he was one of nine lawyers who formed, Robinson & Lawing, LLP. For the past six years he has served as one of its managing partners. Mike has concentrated his practice on matters involving complex civil litigation, medical malpractice defense, insurance defense, intellectual property matters, and corporate litigation planning and loss prevention. Mike is admitted to practice in North Carolina State Courts, the three U.S. District Courts in North Carolina, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court.
In addition to his professional accomplishments, Mike has served in numerous volunteer capacities with a number of charitable and civic organizations within the community.
Mike is a conservative who believes that judges do not make laws, but rather should enforce them. If elected to the North Carolina Supreme Court, Mike will be tough but fair and will apply the law as written by the state legislature. He will work hard to examine every case that comes before him and take a level-headed approach to his work.
Mike received his undergraduate degree from Davidson College and his juris doctor degree with honors from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Mike and his wife Wynn have lived in Winston-Salem for the past 33 years. They have four grown children (three sons and a daughter), two daughters-in-law and two granddaughters.
Founding Dean & Professor, Kenneth F. Kahn School of Law at High Point University
Hon. Mark Martin is the founding dean and professor of law at the Kenneth F. Kahn School of Law at High Point University.
Mark served as Chief Justice of the North Carolina Supreme Court from 2014-2019. He also served on that Court as an Associate Justice, on the North Carolina Court of Appeals, and on a North Carolina Superior Court.
The Chief Justice of the United States appointed Mark to the Committee on Federal-State Jurisdiction of the United States Judicial Conference. He also served on the board of directors of the Conference of Chief Justices.
Mark chairs the Thomson Reuters Judicial Advisory Council. He is a member of the American Law Institute, where he assists with the Third Restatement, Conflict of Laws, and serves on the Region 15 Advisory Committee.
Mark has served on the adjunct faculties of Duke University, North Carolina Central University, and the University of North Carolina law schools. Mark co-taught a course on the various modes of constitutional interpretation with Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. of the United States Supreme Court from 2020-2022.
North Carolina Court of Appeals
Sam J. Ervin, IV, was born in Morganton, North Carolina, on November 18, 1955. He attended the public schools in Burke County, North Carolina, graduating from Freedom High School in 1974. In 1978, Judge Ervin was awarded an A.B., magna cum laude, from Davidson College. After graduating from Davidson, he attended Harvard Law School, from which he received a J.D., cum laude, in 1981.
From 1981 until 1999, Judge Ervin practiced law with the Morganton, North Carolina firm of Byrd, Byrd, Ervin, Whisnant, McMahon, P.A., and its predecessors. While in private practice, Judge Ervin handled a wide variety of civil, criminal, and administrative matters, including many appeals to the North Carolina Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court of North Carolina.
In 1999, Judge Ervin was nominated for a seat on the North Carolina Utilities Commission by Governor James B. Hunt, Jr. He was nominated for a second term on the Utilities Commission by Governor Michael F. Easley in 2007. Both appointments were confirmed by the General Assembly. The Utilities Commission is a quasi-judicial body that is responsible for regulating electric, natural gas, telecommunications, water and sewer, and certain types of transportation service provided to retail customers in North Carolina by privately-owned entities. During his service as a member of the Utilities Commission, Judge Ervin was involved in deciding many important regulatory matters, including, but not limited to, electric and natural gas rate proceedings, electric and natural gas business combination proceedings, proceedings involving applications by electric utilities for authority to construct new generation and transmission facilities, proceedings involving the approval of telecommunications price regulation plans, proceedings arbitrating or otherwise examining the terms and conditions under which competitive telecommunications providers were allowed to interconnect with incumbents, and proceedings addressing issues relating to the adequacy of water and sewer service in certain specific locations.
In addition, Judge Ervin was extensively involved in the activities of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC), having served as Chairman of that organization's Subcommittee on Nuclear Issues and Waste Disposal from 2002 until 2005; as Chairman of that organization's Committee on Electricity from 2004 until 2007; and as a member of its Task Force on Climate Policy from 2007 through 2008. As part of his involvement in NARUC, Judge Ervin supervised its participation in the process that led to the implementation of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. While a member of the Utilities Commission, Judge Ervin testified on two different occasions before the Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality of the Committee on Commerce of the United States House of Representatives. Judge Ervin was a regular speaker at energy-related conferences and seminars during his service as a Utilities Commissioner.
Judge Ervin has also been, at various times, involved in a wide variety of church-related, bar-related, and charitable activities. He is married to Mary Temple Ervin and has two children and two step-children.
Judge Ervin was elected to the North Carolina Court of Appeals at the November 4, 2008, general election. His term as a member of the Court of Appeals commenced on January 1, 2009, and extends until December 31, 2017.
Associate Justice, North Carolina Supreme Court
Early Years
Born in DeKalb County, Georgia in 1952, Robin E. Hudson moved to Greensboro, NC with her family in 1966.
Professional Background
Admitted to the North Carolina Bar in 1976 and practiced law in Raleigh and Durham until her election to the Court of Appeals in November 2000. She is the first North Carolina woman elected to the appellate court division without having been appointed first. She served on the NC Court of Appeals from January 2001 until December 2006. During that time, she helped organize and coordinate the Court of Appeals voluntary mediation program. She began her 8-year term on the Supreme Court in January 2007.
Except for 3 years as assistant appellant defender in the mid-1980's, she practiced law in the private sector and handled a variety of trials and appeals, but concentrated on workers' compensation and tort litigation, with particular emphasis on occupational diseases and products liability. She practiced extensively before the Industrial Commission, as well as in State and Federal courts. Since 1994, she has been certified to mediate cases from Superior Court and the Industrial Commission.
Graduate of Page Senior High School, Greensboro, 1969. Graduated from Yale University in 1973 with a BA degree in philosophy and psychology. Received J.D. from the University of North Carolina School of Law in 1976.
Seventh Division of the Superior Court, North Carolina
Judge Eric Levinson joined the District Attorney’s Office in Cabarrus and Rowan Counties, N.C. as a felony prosecutor following law school, and he prosecuted drug, property, sexual assault, and homicide offenders.
Judge Eric Levinson was elected to the N.C. judiciary in 1996 as a District and Family Court Judge in Charlotte, N.C. In this role, he was recognized for implementing best-practices in our criminal and child support enforcement courts and became a N.C. Certified Juvenile Court Judge.
Judge Eric Levinson was elected statewide in 2002 as one of fifteen members of the N.C. Court of Appeals in Raleigh, N.C., where he served as an Associate Judge and the Court’s youngest member. He authored hundreds of legal opinions in disputes and lawsuits concerning criminal, civil and administrative matters.
Judge Eric Levinson was appointed by the Bush Administration in 2007 as the Justice Attache to Iraq for the U.S. Department of Justice. As Justice Attache, Levinson managed the U.S. government’s diplomatic relationship with the Iraqi judiciary and its Chief Justice, Medhat al Mahmoud, and advanced the establishment of Major Crimes Courts where terrorists were prosecuted.
Judge Eric Levinson worked in Kabul, Afghanistan as a Rule of Law and Courts Advisor in 2008. In this role, he collaborated with members of the Supreme Court of Afghanistan and helped draft and advance guidelines to establish commercial courts to adjudicate business, contract and related civil conflicts.
Judge Eric Levinson was appointed to the N.C. Superior Court in 2009 after a bipartisan group of Republican and Democratic lawmakers, business professionals, attorneys and community stakeholders endorsed his appointment. Levinson presently holds court in counties all across western, central and eastern N.C. and presides over violent crimes against persons (homicide, sexual assault, armed robbery, serious assault) as well as civil conflicts (complex business disputes, class action, property).
Judge Eric Levinson gained his Juris Doctorate from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Law where he was President of the Student Bar Association. He obtained a BBA in Finance,cum laude, at the University of Georgia, where he was an Honors Program student. Levinson also completed the Institute on Comparative Political and Economic Systems through the Fund for American Studies in Washington, D.C. and Georgetown University, and completed a program in International Finance hosted by the University of London, England. He is a certified Superior Court mediator, and is a N.C. Certified Juvenile Court Judge.
Fmr. Chief Justice, North Carolina Supreme Court
Chief Justice Cheri Beasley has spent more than 20 years dedicated to the rule of law. She began her judicial career as a district court judge in Cumberland County, where she served for a decade before being elected to the North Carolina Court of Appeals in 2008. She served as an associate justice on the Supreme Court of North Carolina for seven years before being appointed by Governor Roy Cooper to lead the Supreme Court and North Carolina's third branch of government, the Judicial Branch. She is the first African-American woman in the Supreme Court’s 200-year history to serve as Chief Justice.
Chief Justice Beasley has spent her entire career advocating for courts that are independent, fair, and accessible, and that serve every person with dignity and respect. As Chief Justice, she is advocating for a court system that not only solves legal disputes, but also helps people better their lives. By engaging local judges, educators and law enforcement, she is helping to reform discipline in our schools and keeping kids out of our courtrooms. She is committed to expanding specialized treatment courts that better serve the needs of North Carolina’s children and families. She is also working to leverage the power of technology to make sure our courts are efficient and accessible.
She has lectured extensively to promote the administration of justice, the importance of an independent judiciary, and fair judicial selection. She is active in her community through leadership in her church, First Baptist of Raleigh, her support of hunger relief efforts, and her mentoring of students from elementary school to law school. She is a graduate of Douglass College of Rutgers University, the University of Tennessee College of Law, and Duke University School of Law where she obtained her LL.M. She and her husband, Curtis Owens, are the proud parents of twin sons, Thomas and Matthew.
Vice President of Marketing and Communications, John Locke Foundation
As Vice President of Marketing and Communications, Donna shares the foundation’s message of freedom, free markets, and limited government across media platforms. She co-hosts Carolina Journal Radio, a weekly syndicated radio show produced by JLF and heard on more than a dozen stations across North Carolina. Donna came to JLF in 2003 after freelance writing for Carolina Journal and contributing to projects for the North Carolina Education Alliance. Her career has been spent in marketing, public relations, and broadcasting, and includes time at UNC-TV and The Arizona Republic, the daily newspaper serving metropolitan Phoenix. Donna is a graduate of Arizona State University and is married to Rick Martinez. She and Rick co-host “You Don’t Say,” a daily radio talk show heard on NewsRadio 680 WPTF in the Triangle.
Sr Corporate Counsel, Cisco Systems, Inc.
Senior Fellow, National Review
Bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy is a contributing editor at National Review, a senior fellow at National Review Institute, and a Fox News contributor. He is a former Chief Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York and led the terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheikh” (Omar Abdel Rahman) and eleven other jihadists for conducting a war of urban terrorism against the United States that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. During is 20-year career as a prosecutor, he received numerous honors, including the Justice Department’s highest awards. Andy speaks and writes widely on law and national security, radical Islam, politics, and culture. He has testified before Congress as an expert on issues of constitutional law, counterterrorism, and law-enforcement. He is a columnist for The Hill, and his essays and book reviews appear frequently at The New Criterion. His most recent New York Times bestselling book is Ball of Collusion (Encounter Books, 2019), about the Russiagate controversy (an updated version was published in 2020). His other books include Willful Blindness (2008), The Grand Jihad (2010), Spring Fever: The Illusion of Islamic Democracy (2012), and Faithless Execution (2014). He has also written several pamphlets in the Broadside series published by Encounter Books, most recently Islam and Free Speech (2015).
Executive Vice President, The Federalist Society
Dean Reuter is Executive Vice President at the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. He has served in two federal government agency Offices of the Inspector General, as Counsel to the Inspector General and Deputy Inspector General, responsible for policing the use of federal funds granted and contracted through those agencies. As such, he helped conduct and oversee criminal investigations across the country. He is the principal author of the non-fiction book, The Hidden Nazi: The Untold Story of America's Deal with the Devil, and editor of Liberty’s Nemesis: The Unchecked Expansion of the State and Confronting Terror: 9/11 and the Future of American National Security. He was appointed by the President and served as Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National and Community Service, and recently served as an appointee on the U.S. Commission on Presidential Scholars. He is a graduate of Hood College (BA with Honors) and the University of Maryland School of Law.
Attorney, Arguedas, Cassman & Headley, LLP
Ms. Arguedas is recognized as one of the finest criminal defense lawyers in the United States. In her 20-plus years in private practice, she has represented high-profile clients in some of the most visible cases around the country, as well as many little-known clients on relatively routine matters that never make the nightly news.
Ms. Arguedas is equally adept at handling complex white-collar cases, sensational murders, and the full range of less serious criminal cases. She works closely with other ACH lawyers as well as a team of investigators, jury consultants and other top experts she has assembled over more than two decades.
Singled out for her thorough preparation, shrewd strategizing, and impressive courtroom skills, Cris has been named the lawyer other lawyers would hire if they got arrested (California Lawyer), one of the 10 best lawyers in the Bay Area (San Francisco Chronicle, Northern California Super Lawyers), one of the 50 most influential women lawyers in the United States (National Law Journal), one of the 100 top lawyers in California (San Francisco Daily Journal, The Recorder), and one of the five most promising women lawyers in the country (Time). She was named to “The International Who’s Who of Business Crime Lawyers 2010”, is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, and in 2010 was inducted into the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame of the Litigation Section of the State Bar of California (an honor shared by only 20 other attorneys in the State).
Ms. Arguedas expertise also makes her a highly sought-after lecturer, teacher, and advisor to public officials in both major parties. She has served on advisory committees for the District Attorney of San Francisco and for the current and two past United States Attorneys for the Northern District of California. At the statewide level, she has been appointed to several commissions on judicial standards by the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court. Cris has also headed U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer’s Federal Judicial Selection Committee, which recommends nominees for the federal judiciary and for the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California.
Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division, The United States Department of Justice
Leslie R. Caldwell was confirmed as the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division on May 15, 2014.
As head of the Criminal Division, Ms. Caldwell oversees nearly 600 attorneys who prosecute federal criminal cases across the country, help develop criminal law and formulate criminal enforcement policy. She also works closely with the nation’s 93 United States Attorneys in the investigation and prosecution of criminal matters in their districts.
Ms. Caldwell has dedicated most of her professional career to handling federal criminal cases, both as a prosecutor and as defense counsel. From 2002 to 2004, Ms. Caldwell served as the director of the Justice Department’s Enron Task Force. When she worked at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California from 1999 to 2002, she served as the Chief of the Criminal Division and the Chief of the Securities Fraud Section. During her eleven years in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York from 1987 to 1998, her positions included Senior Trial Counsel for the Business & Securities Fraud Section and Chief of the Violent Criminal Enterprises Section. For her work on the Enron Task Force, Ms. Caldwell received the Attorney General’s Award for Exceptional Service. She is also the recipient of the Attorney General’s John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation and the Attorney General’s Award for Fraud Prevention.
Prior to joining the Criminal Division, Ms. Caldwell was a partner at Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP, a position she held since 2004. From 2004 to 2009, Ms. Caldwell was co-chair of the firm’s Corporate Investigations and White Collar Practice Group.
Ms. Caldwell received a B.A. in Economics from Pennsylvania State University and a J.D. from the George Washington University Law School.
Partner, McGuireWoods
Mr. Hatch is a partner in the firm’s Government Investigations and White Collar Litigation group. Prior to joining McGuireWoods, Mr. Hatch spent nine years as a federal prosecutor with the United States Attorney’s Office, serving in the Alexandria, Richmond and Norfolk divisions of the Eastern District of Virginia. Most recently, Ben served as the Managing Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) and Criminal Chief in the Norfolk Division.
During his time as an AUSA, Mr. Hatch successfully argued nine appeals in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and conducted thirteen jury trials and two bench trials in the Norfolk, Alexandria and Richmond Divisions.
Mr. Hatch's work involved a diverse array of criminal cases, including prosecuting complex national security matters, white collar, public corruption and violent crime. Mr. Hatch received The John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation, one of the highest awards given for trial practice by the Department of Justice, from then Attorney General Eric Holder for his role in a two month trial of several Somali pirates.
Mr. Hatch previously served as a law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court of the United States and Judge J. Michael Luttig of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. He graduated magna cum laude from the Harvard Law School. At Harvard, Mr. Hatch served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He was also part of a team that won Harvard Law School's Ames Moot Court Competition, and Ben received the George Leisure Award for being recognized as the best oralist.
For the last six years, Mr. Hatch has served as an Adjunct Professor teaching the Advanced Brief Writing class at the College of William and Mary Marshall-Wythe School of Law.
Partner, King & Spalding
John Richter is a trial and investigations partner in the Special Matters and Investigations Practice Group, and represents and defends companies, Boards of Directors, Board committees, and individuals facing a variety of white-collar criminal and regulatory enforcement matters, parallel civil litigation, and internal corporate investigations. John previously served as the Acting Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division at the U.S. Department of Justice and as the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Oklahoma, having been nominated by President George W. Bush and confirmed by unanimous consent of the U.S. Senate.
Partner, Goodwin Procter LLP
Joseph Savage, a partner in Goodwin's Securities Litigation & White Collar Defense Group, concentrates his practice on white collar criminal defense, governmental investigations work and complex civil litigation. His practice involves representing individuals and companies in a wide variety of fraud, false claims act, securities, health care, tax, public corruption, environmental and other investigations by federal, state and local law enforcement and government regulators, as well as representing companies and individuals in civil litigation, especially complex commercial disputes.
With more than 30 years’ experience, Mr. Savage is one of the most widely respected and accomplished trial lawyers in the nation. He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and is annually recognized by Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business and U.S. News-Best Lawyers, which named him Boston white collar “Lawyer of the Year” for 2017.
Freelance Journalist and Author
Stuart Taylor, Jr. is a Washington writer focusing on legal and policy issues and a National Journal contributing editor. He occasionally practices law.
Taylor has coauthored three books. All have been acclaimed by commentators across the ideological spectrum. In January 2017, KC Johnson and Taylor authored The Campus Rape Frenzy: The Attack on Due Process at America's Universities. In 2012, Richard Sander and Taylor authored Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It's Intended to Help, and Why Universities Won't Admit It. In 2007, Taylor and Johnson authored Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Fraud. Sander and Taylor have also filed amicus briefs in Supreme Court cases involving admissions preferences.
Since 1980, Taylor has done reporting and commentary about issues ranging from the biggest Supreme Court cases to race, voting rights, mindlessly excessive criminal penalties, guilt-presuming campus rape processes, journalistic bias, the death penalty, war powers, gerrymandering, guns, polarization, civil liberties, national security, torture, campaign finance, education, impeachment, and other issues. He has often been called one of the nation's best legal journalists and is known for challenging both liberal and conservative conventional wisdom.
Taylor was a reporter for The New York Times from 1980-1988, covering legal affairs and then the Supreme Court. He wrote commentaries and long features for The American Lawyer, Legal Times and their affiliates from 1989-1997, and for National Journal and Newsweek from 1998 through 2010. He has written (less often) on a freelance basis for numerous publications since 2010. He has written op-eds for The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and The New York Daily News and longer commentaries for RealClearPolitics, The Atlantic, The New Republic, the (late) Weekly Standard, National Review, Slate, The Daily Beast, Harper’s, Reader’s Digest, Time and other magazines. He has been interviewed on all major television and radio networks. He taught “Law and the News Media” at Stanford Law School in 2011 and 2012 and practices law on occasion.
Taylor graduated from Princeton University in 1970 with an A.B. in History. After working as a reporter for the Baltimore Evening Sun and Sun from 1971-1974, he moved to Harvard Law School, was a Harvard Law Review note editor, and graduated in 1977 at the top of his class, with high honors. He also won a Frederick Sheldon Traveling Fellowship and traveled around the world in 1977-1978 while studying freedom of the press in the United Kingdom and Kenya.
Taylor practiced law with Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, in Washington, D.C., from 1977-1980 before returning to journalism in 1980 by joining the Washington Bureau of The New York Times.
Taylor's journalism honors include the 2009 Northern California Innocence Project Media Award for his work on the Duke lacrosse rape fraud; a 2002 National Headliner Award for best special magazine column on one subject; and a share of The American Lawyer’s National Magazine Award for a March 1990 special issue on the drug war. He was a National Magazine Award finalist in 1993 and 1997 and was nominated by The New York Times for a Pulitzer Prize in 1988.
Senior Fellow, National Review
Bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy is a contributing editor at National Review, a senior fellow at National Review Institute, and a Fox News contributor. He is a former Chief Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York and led the terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheikh” (Omar Abdel Rahman) and eleven other jihadists for conducting a war of urban terrorism against the United States that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. During is 20-year career as a prosecutor, he received numerous honors, including the Justice Department’s highest awards. Andy speaks and writes widely on law and national security, radical Islam, politics, and culture. He has testified before Congress as an expert on issues of constitutional law, counterterrorism, and law-enforcement. He is a columnist for The Hill, and his essays and book reviews appear frequently at The New Criterion. His most recent New York Times bestselling book is Ball of Collusion (Encounter Books, 2019), about the Russiagate controversy (an updated version was published in 2020). His other books include Willful Blindness (2008), The Grand Jihad (2010), Spring Fever: The Illusion of Islamic Democracy (2012), and Faithless Execution (2014). He has also written several pamphlets in the Broadside series published by Encounter Books, most recently Islam and Free Speech (2015).
Author, Sharia-ism Is Here: The Battle to Control Women and Everyone Else
Joy Brighton is a former Wall Street trader who today is part of an international team of experts concerned about the non-transparent risks of the Shariah-compliant Islamic finance investment market. She speaks with legal, policy, grassroots, and legislative leaders who are concerned about the challenge to America's national security, civil and women's rights, First Amendment freedoms, and free capital financial markets posed by Shariaism, the political movement of radical Islam. She is the author of Shariaism is Here: The Battle for Control of Women and Everyone Else, released January 2014.
Ms. Brighton is a graduate of Columbia Business School and has been a fixed-income salesperson and trader for Lehman Brothers, a mortgage pipeline hedge trader for Chase Home Mortgage, and an adjunct Professor of Securities and Investments at Fairleigh Dickinson University and Ramapo College. Later, as a graduate of Fordham University with a Master's in Psychological Counseling, Ms. Brighton worked as an executive coach catering to investment professionals and a college mental health counselor.
Senior Fellow, National Review
Bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy is a contributing editor at National Review, a senior fellow at National Review Institute, and a Fox News contributor. He is a former Chief Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York and led the terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheikh” (Omar Abdel Rahman) and eleven other jihadists for conducting a war of urban terrorism against the United States that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. During is 20-year career as a prosecutor, he received numerous honors, including the Justice Department’s highest awards. Andy speaks and writes widely on law and national security, radical Islam, politics, and culture. He has testified before Congress as an expert on issues of constitutional law, counterterrorism, and law-enforcement. He is a columnist for The Hill, and his essays and book reviews appear frequently at The New Criterion. His most recent New York Times bestselling book is Ball of Collusion (Encounter Books, 2019), about the Russiagate controversy (an updated version was published in 2020). His other books include Willful Blindness (2008), The Grand Jihad (2010), Spring Fever: The Illusion of Islamic Democracy (2012), and Faithless Execution (2014). He has also written several pamphlets in the Broadside series published by Encounter Books, most recently Islam and Free Speech (2015).
Syndicated Columnist
New York political commentor Deroy Murdock is a Fox News Contributor, a Contributing Editor with National Review Online, an emeritus Media Fellow with the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University; and a Senior Fellow with the Atlas Network, which supports and connects some 500 free-market think tanks in the USA and some 95 countries world-wide. Mr. Murdock’s weekly column — “This Opinion Just In…” — appears in the New York Post, the Washington Times, the New Hampshire Union-Leader, and other newspapers across America. He has appeared on radio shows across America and presents commentaries on Fox News Radio’s podcast, The Rundown. He is a veteran of the 1980 and 1984 Reagan for President campaigns and Steve Forbes’ 2000 White House bid.
As a popular public speaker, he has lectured or debated at the Cato Institute, the Council on Foreign Relations; Harvard Medical School, the Heritage Foundation; the National Academy of Sciences; Dartmouth, Stanford, and Tulane universities; and various fora, from Bogotá to Buenos Aires to Budapest. He is a native of Los Angeles, a graduate of Georgetown University, and a resident of Manhattan, where he earned an MBA from New York University. His program included a semester of study at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Deroy Murdock hopes that someday the free society will bring him — and every American — more leisure time to experience fine dining, motion pictures, skiing, live music, and the priceless joys of family, friends, and loved ones.
Senior Fellow, National Review
Bestselling author Andrew C. McCarthy is a contributing editor at National Review, a senior fellow at National Review Institute, and a Fox News contributor. He is a former Chief Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York and led the terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheikh” (Omar Abdel Rahman) and eleven other jihadists for conducting a war of urban terrorism against the United States that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a plot to bomb New York City landmarks. During is 20-year career as a prosecutor, he received numerous honors, including the Justice Department’s highest awards. Andy speaks and writes widely on law and national security, radical Islam, politics, and culture. He has testified before Congress as an expert on issues of constitutional law, counterterrorism, and law-enforcement. He is a columnist for The Hill, and his essays and book reviews appear frequently at The New Criterion. His most recent New York Times bestselling book is Ball of Collusion (Encounter Books, 2019), about the Russiagate controversy (an updated version was published in 2020). His other books include Willful Blindness (2008), The Grand Jihad (2010), Spring Fever: The Illusion of Islamic Democracy (2012), and Faithless Execution (2014). He has also written several pamphlets in the Broadside series published by Encounter Books, most recently Islam and Free Speech (2015).
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