Courts & Trials in the Digital Age

Biographies

Professor Karim Benyekhlef

Professor in the Faculty of Law at the Université de Montréal

Karim Benyekhlef has been a professor in the Faculty of Law at the Université de Montréal since 1989. He has been seconded to the Centre de recherche en droit public since 1990 and served as its Director from 2006 to 2014. He was also the Director of the Regroupement stratégique Droit, changements et gouvernance (Strategic Law, Change and Governance Group), which brings together more than 50 researchers, from 2006 to 2014. At the same time, he was the Scientific Director of the Centre d’études et de recherches internationales de l’Université de Montréal (CÉRIUM – the Université de Montréal’s International Research and Study Centre) from 2009 to 2012. He is now the Director of the Cyberjustice Laboratory, which he founded in 2010. The Cyberjustice Laboratory has obtained in 2015 the award «Mérite Innovation» from the Bar of Quebec (Innovation Award). He holds the Chaire de recherche en information juridique Lexum (Lexum Research Chair on Legal Information) and serves as a member of CÉRIUM’s science and advisory committees. He received in 2016 from the Bar of Quebec the distinction Advocatus Emeritus. He holds the 2019-2020 Alexandre Koyré Excellence Research Chair.

Member of the Barreau du Québec (Québec Bar Association) since 1985, he practiced in the federal Department of Justice from 1986 to 1989. His teaching and research areas are constitutional law (human rights and freedoms), international law, information technologies law, legal theory and history of law. In 1995, Professor Benyekhlef founded the electronic law journal Lex Electronica, the very first French-language online law journal.

He also initiated the first online dispute resolution projects (the CyberTribunal Project, 1996-1999; eResolution, 1999-2001; ECODIR, 2000-today).  He now serves as Director of the Cyberjustice Laboratory, the work of which is designed to increase and facilitate access to justice. From 2011 to 2018, he lead a project funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) of Canada in the context of the Major Collaborative Research Initiatives (MCRI) Program: Rethinking Procedural Law: Towards Cyberjustice, composed of an international team made up of some 30 researchers from over 23 different universities in Canada, the United States, Australia and Europe. He is now leading the project «Autonomy through Cyberjustice Technologies and Artificial Intelligence» (ACT Project) funded by the partnership program of SSHRC (2018-2024). ACT aims to increase access to justice through the use of artificial intelligence (AI). Over the next 6 years, ACT will be able to count on a multidisciplinary and international team of 50 researchers, as well as 42 partners including research centers, public institutions, legal professionals, representatives from civil society and private sector actors.

Professor Benyekhlef has also participated in developing good governance programs in Africa and the Caribbean (through the Canadian International Development Agency, the United Nations and the European Commission- 1990 and 2000).

With Professor Fabien Gélinas of McGill University’s Faculty of Law, he is the author of Le règlement en ligne des conflits. Enjeux de la cyberjustice (Paris: Éditions Romillat, 2003, available in English here: Online Dispute Resolution), and in 2008 he published Une possible histoire de la norme. Les normativités émergentes de la mondialisation, (A Possible History of Norms. The Emerging Normativities of Globalization, 2nd ed: 2015). The latter was awarded the Prix de la Fondation du Barreau du Québec in 2009. In 2013, he edited a collective work entitled Gouvernance and Risk: The Challenges of Global Regulation, in 2016, Vers un droit global? (Towards Global Law?) and, the same year, eAccess to Justice, published by the University of Ottawa Press, and co-edited with Jane Bailey, Jacquelyn Burkell and Fabien Gélinas.  He was the editor of a collective book published in 2017: Au-delà de la représentation: les figures de la démocratie (Beyond Representation: The Models of Democracy). With Pierre-Luc Déziel, he published in 2018 a casebook on the right to privacy in Quebec and Canada: Le droit à la vie privée en droit québécois et canadien, Montréal, Thomson-Reuters, 2018. His most recent work, in 2021, is AI and Law. A Critical Overview, a collective book presenting the effects of AI on law and justice.

Tony Douglas

CEO of For The Record

Tony is a pioneer in the judicial technology sector with over twenty years’ experience in delivering world-first innovations to drive efficiencies in the way the court record is captured and delivered.

He is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading experts on best-practice AV evidence recording technologies and processes.

Since purchasing Auscript out of voluntary administration in 2004 with his business partner Peter Wyatt, Tony has transformed the Company into one of the world’s largest court recording and transcription firms. He spearheaded the decision to re-engineer Auscript’s former analogue transcript production process by introducing world-first digital technologies which have dramatically improved the speed of delivery and accuracy of the court record.

Today, Tony leads the research and development team – FTR Labs. The court recording technologies developed by FTR Labs, under Tony’s leadership, have ensured Auscript clients have access to the latest solutions for capturing a crystal clear audio record – allowing a high-quality transcript to be produced by the Company’s skilled Audio Transcribers and Stenographers. FTR Lab’s court recording solutions have grown to become the world’s most relied upon – with 27,000 installations across 62 countries.

Tony is a valued member of several associations, including: Associate Member, Audio Engineering Society, Australasian Institute of Judicial Administration, Australasian Court Reporting Industry Association, and American Association of Electronic Reporting and Transcribers.

Martin Gruen

Deputy Director Emeritus, Center for Legal & Court Technology, William & Mary Law School

Managing Member, Martin E. Gruen Consulting LLC

Martin Gruen is the Deputy Director Emeritus for the Center for Legal & Court Technology and the Managing Member of Martin E. Gruen Consulting, LLC. He brings over forty years of experience in providing court technology systems to the legal community. Initially concentrating in the areas of sound reinforcement and audio recording, Mr. Gruen has now emerged as a national expert in court-related high-technology legal uses. As founder and president of Applied Legal Technologies, Mr. Gruen designed many of the nation’s state-of-the-art court technology installations and has served as a consultant to several major legal technology manufacturers.

The Center for Legal & Court Technology includes William & Mary Law School’s McGlothlin Courtroom, the world’s most technologically advanced trial and appellate courtroom and the center of CLCT’s experimental work. Since the project’s beginning, Mr. Gruen has been in charge of the courtroom’s ongoing technological growth and development and has directed, installed, and designed the technology systems within the courtroom. According to Professor Fred Lederer, Chancellor Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Legal & Court Technology, “Martin Gruen is a truly extraordinary courtroom designer and technologist. We would not have CLCT and the Courtroom 21 Project without him and his creative work.”

David Bartee

Courts IT Director for the County of Fairfax, Virginia – Retired

David Bartee recently retired as the Courts IT Director for the Fairfax County Courts responsible for IT and Project Management for three Fairfax County Courts: Circuit Court & Records, General District Court, Juvenile & Domestic Relations District Court; and ad hoc support to the Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney, Office of the Sheriff, Fairfax Bar Association and Fairfax Law Library.  Mr. Bartee served the Fairfax County Government and Courts for more than 33 years, overseeing the advancement of technology for the courts that included the implementation of a state-of-the art Courtroom Technology Management and Evidence Presentation System to coincide with courthouse expansion construction projects, courtroom renovations, digital upgrades, audio recording, interpreting systems and several court related application development projects.

Mr. Bartee continues to serve the court and legal community as a contractor and consultant. He holds a Master’s in Public Administration from George Mason University and Bachelor’s in Business Administration from James Madison University.  He resides in Fairfax County and serves on multiple boards and charitable organizations. He also serves as chair of the Court Affiliates Technologist’s Committee.

Fredric I. Lederer

Fredric I. Lederer is Chancellor Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Legal & Court Technology at William & Mary Law School. Professor Lederer’s areas of specialization include
evidence, trial practice, criminal procedure, military law, legal technology, and the legal issues related to artificial intelligence and related technologies. He was one of the founders of the ABA
prize-winning Marshall-Wythe Legal Skills Program, in which all students spent two years in simulated practice law firms, where they learned professional ethics, legal research and writing, interviewing, negotiation, alternative dispute resolution, and basic trial and appellate practice—much in the form of simulated client representation.

Professor Lederer is the author or co-author of twelve books, numerous articles, and two law-related education television series, and he is the author of a popular series of “fairy-tale” trials for elementary and middle school students. As Founder and Director of CLCT, Professor Lederer is responsible for the McGlothlin Courtroom, the world’s most technologically advanced trial and appellate courtroom, and the Court Affiliates, an organization of federal, state, and foreign courts. Working with CLCT’s Deputy Director Emeritus, Martin Gruen, Professor Lederer conducts legal and empirical research and provides courtroom and hearing room design consulting throughout the world.
Professor Lederer received his B.S. from New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering and his J.D. from Columbia University Law School, where he was a member of the Board of Editors of the Columbia Law Review and recipient of the Archie O’Dawson prize. He holds an LL.M. from the University of Virginia. His post-graduate work includes a year as a Fulbright-Hayes Scholar in Freiburg, Germany. He served as an active-duty member of the United States Army’s Judge Advocate General’s Corps until 1980, when he joined the William & Mary faculty. He has served as prosecutor, defense counsel, trial judge, and law reform expert.

Vannessa Rockers

Self-Help Center Supervisor for Johnson County 10^th Judicial District Court Clerk’s Office

Vannessa Rockers started her career with the Johnson County District Court Clerk’s Office a little over five years ago, for four of those years Vannessa was a Trial Clerk IV, the Supervisor of the Self-Help Center. During this time, she has aided in the advancement of online access to Justice for the 10^th District and surrounding areas. The Self-Help Center started with the primary focus of assisting in Domestic (family law) cases and although they heavily still assist with those cases, during her venture they have grown to assist Self-Represented parties in many other case types. Vannessa decided after about a year in the position that other natures of Self-Represented parties needed assistance and so now they assist in Protection Orders, Quiet Titles, Name Changes, Subpoenas and Small Claims.

Chris Shenefiel

CCI Senior Cyber Law Researcher at William and Mary

Chris Shenefiel is a CCI Senior Cyber Law Researcher at William and Mary.  Previously, he worked for Cisco Systems, where he was responsible for selecting, funding and managing cybersecurity research programs at Cisco Systems.   He also served as a Data Scientist; uncovering security vulnerability trends and defining ways to improve Cisco’s offer security.  In his role as an Adjunct Lecturer he continues to teach a graduate and undergraduate course in Applied Cybersecurity for the William and Mary Computer Science Department and guest lecture in the Law School.

He has over 30 years of advanced technology experience in engineering, marketing, consulting and general business management with several of the world’s largest communications corporations including Motorola, Southwestern Bell, and AT&T Communications in capacities that include software design, user interface design, applied R&D, professional services, project management and product management.   He graduated from the University of Illinois with a Masters in Engineering Psychology and recently earned a Franklin Fellowship at William and Mary Law School.

Daniel Shin

Assistant Director of Research, CLCT

CoVA CCI Research Scientist

Daniel Shin is the Cybersecurity Researcher at CLCT. He received his B.A. from Northwestern University and his M.A. from the University of Mannheim in Germany. He received his J.D. from William & Mary Law School, where he was a CLCT Graduate Fellow. Mr. Shin is admitted to practice in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

While in law school, Mr. Shin focused his legal studies on the intersection of technology and law, including Fourth Amendment search and seizure jurisprudence, national security law, and Rules of Evidence on authenticating digital exhibits.

Currently, Mr. Shin is actively participating in activities of the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative’s Coastal Virginia Node and curates CLCT’s Cybersecurity and Information Security Newsletter. His research area focuses on legal issues as they pertain to cybersecurity, blockchain technology, the Internet of Things, and artificial intelligence. Specifically, his interests involve the implications of deep learning technology and its social and legal impact on privacy and civil liberties.

This content has been updated on May 31, 2023 at 5:01 pm.