December 2007 Newsletter

Alumni News Briefs

Karl Dean, ’80, succeeded Bill Purcell, ’79, as Mayor of Nashville. Dean, who had previously headed Metropolitan Nashville’s legal department for eight years, took office Sept. 21. Both Dean and his wife, Anne Davis, ’81, are members of the Vanderbilt’s adjunct law faculty. Read a profile of Anne Davis by reporter Gail Kerr in The Tennessean

Ed Yarbrough, ’73, is the U.S. Attorney for Middle Tennessee. Yarbrough was formerly a partner with Hollins Wagster Yarbrough Weatherly & Rabin. He now heads a staff of 31 Assistant U.S. Attorneys. Read complete story.

Lawrence R. Ahern III, ’72, managing partner of Burr & Forman’s Nashville office and an adjunct professor of law at Vanderbilt, has been elected president of the American Board of Certification (ABC), which advocates attorney certification in consumer and business bankruptcy and creditors’ rights law. Ahern, who is a Fellow in the American College of Bankruptcy, is an expert in business transactions whose practice with Burr & Forman focuses on creditors’ rights and bankruptcy, as well as commercial law. He teaches Secured Transactions at Vanderbilt. The ABC is a non-profit credentialing organization sponsored by the American Bankruptcy Institute and the Commercial Law League of America. Read complete story.

Walter Lee Davis, Jr., ‘ 67, was elected president of the National Association of Estate Planners & Councils (“NAEPC”) at its 44th Annual Conference held Nov. 14-16 in New Orleans. The NAEPC is a national organization of approximately 200 affiliated Estate Planning Councils with a membership of approximately 26,000 professional estate planners. Davis, who is also licensed as a Certified Public Accountant and a Real Estate Broker, is certified as an Estate Planning Specialist by the Tennessee Commission on Continuing Legal Education and Specialization.

Gary Brown, ’80, a securities law expert who is a partner with Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz in Nashville, was the keynote speaker at the 100th annual convention of the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy. His remarks addressed the future of Sarbanes-Oxley. Brown is a member of Vanderbilt’s adjunct law faculty.

Kim Kelley, ’80, is an Associate Judge for the 10th Judicial Circuit of Illinois at Peoria County. She took the bench in December 2006.

Martha Triplett, ’86 (BA ’83), has been elected to the Board of Governors of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association (CTLA). She was also appointed by Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell to serve on the Connecticut State Board of Accountancy. Martha is a partner at Delaney, Zemetis & Triplett in Wallingford, Conn.

Dana Brown Shaffer, ’94, has been promoted at the Federal Communications Commission in Washington, D.C., to Chief of the agency’s Wireline Competition Bureau and selected as a member of the Senior Executive Service of the United States of America. The Wireline Competition Bureau develops and recommends policy goals, objectives, programs and plans for the Commission on matters concerning wireline telecommunications.

Phillip Fowler, ’97, has been elected chair of the Indiana State Bar Association’s Litigation Section. Fowler is a partner with Bingham McHale in Indianapolis.

Bill Fenwick, ’67, founding partner, Fenwick & West, delivered a lecture, “Deal Making and Litigating in a High Tech World,” on the evolution of intellectual property rights law at Vanderbilt in October. Fenwick’s lecture was the inaugural Fenwick & West Lecture in Intellectual Property. Read more about Bill’s career.

Read Class Notes online!

In Memoriam

Laird R. Daubenspeck, ’68 – Dec. 12, 2007
Michael Shaheen, ’65 – Nov. 29, 2007 – Read New York Times obituary.
The Honorable Matthew J. Vitanza, ’52 – Nov. 13, 2007
Larry Ramsey, ’70 – Oct. 29, 2007, of leukemia
James H. Epps, ’62 – Oct. 19, 2007
Whitney Stegall, ’50 – Sept. 21, 2007
Richard F. LaRoche Sr., ’50 – Sept. 19, 2007
Joe H. Foy, ’50 – Sept. 17, 2007
William Donald Overbey, ’62 – Sept. 8, 2007
Herbert B. Moriarty Jr., ’52 (B.A. ’50) – Aug. 27, 2007
Elizabeth Whitney Caprini, ’80 – June 7, 2007