2009 Newsletter Archive

@John Jay News and Events of Interest to the College Community

November 18, 2009

Worth NotingNovember 18-22 8:00 PMIl Furioso: The Birthof Modern JusticeA dual-language adaptationof Aeschylus’ “Eumenides”Presented by the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts with support from the Department of African American Studies

Gerald W. Lynch Theater

November 19 10:00 AM2009 Annual Career FairSponsored by the Office ofCareer Development Services

Gymnasium, Haaren Hall

November 30 5:30 PMTattletales and Victims:Rethinking Police Use of Confidential InformantsPresented by the Center onRace, Crime and JusticeDelores Jones-Brown, Director, CRCJJon Shane, The Police Foundation

Room 1311, North Hall

December 2 6:00 PMMoot Court in Forensic ComputingSponsored by the Master’s Programin Forensic Computing

Room 230, Haaren Hall

“We should feel confident that working together…we can move the world. Let’s get started.”

With these words, John Jay President Jeremy Travis concluded his annual State of the College address on October 21, in which he spoke of creating a vision for the College for the next five years, as John Jay approaches its 50th anniversary in 2014.

The master plan that Travis called “John Jay @ 50,” which he hopes to produce by the end of the academic year through a collaborative effort, will address questions surrounding the core issue of how John Jay will be different in 2014 while remaining true to its mission of “Educating for Justice.”

Travis launched his address with a review of the “simply breathtaking” changes that have occurred in the past five years to create a “re-vitalized” John Jay. Among those he cited were:

• A 40-percent increase in the size of the entering class of baccalaureate freshman students, to 1,657;

• A 33-percent increase in the size of the College’s full-time faculty, with 50 percent of those faculty members having been hired in the past five years;

• Creation of educational partnerships with community colleges to provide joint associate-baccalaureate degree programs through what has been called the CUNY Justice Academy;

• Development of new undergraduate majors in English, Economics, Global History and Gender Studies, and graduate programs in Forensic Mental Health Counseling and International Crime and Justice, with several more bachelor’s

and master’s degree programs “in the pipeline”;• Creation of a First-Year Experience program

to enhance student success;• Redesign of the Honors Program, the science

and math curriculum, the general-education curriculum and several existing baccalaureate majors;

• Significant improvements in technological infrastructure, internal and external communica-tions, and fundraising from government and private sources;

• The “emergence of the John Jay research juggernaut,” with grant receipts more than doubling in the past four years.

“No other institution in the world can claim that its faculty are so deeply involved in so many pressing issues of justice and injustice,” Travis said. “As we move forward to John Jay @ 50,

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we should ensure that the College remains an ‘institution of consequence’ — that we partner with agencies and individuals who would benefit from the expertise of our faculty, the passion of our students, and the independence of an academic institution.”

In looking ahead, Travis conceded an uncertain future that could include a weakened national economy, depressed tax revenues and unprecedented shortfalls in government budgets. Nonetheless, he reassured the audience in the Gerald W. Lynch Theater, “my top priority will be to sustain our forward momentum…. We may need to tighten our belts and slow the pace of change, but I am confident that we will continue moving forward toward a shared vision of the John Jay of the future.”

The development of a new Master Plan for

John Jay is poised to expand its imprint on the uppermost echelons of the U.S. Justice Department, with the announcement by the White House that President Obama plans to nominate Distinguished Professor James Lynch as Director of the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS).

If confirmed by the Senate, Lynch would join Ellen Scrivner, former director of the John Jay Leadership Academy, and alumnus Benjamin Tucker (BS, 1977) in the Obama Administration. Scrivner has been appointed as Deputy Director of the National Institute of Justice and Tucker has been tapped as Deputy Director for State, Local and Tribal Affairs of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

According to President Jeremy Travis, “While the College will miss Dr. Lynch, we are honored that a highly regarded member of our faculty has been nominated to such an important position in the Obama Administration. He brings to the position a wealth of knowledge and practical experience that will be invaluable to the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the nation.”

Lynch, a member of the Department of

Criminal Justice, is a widely acknowledged expert on crime statistics and victimization surveys. He previously served on a National Academy of Sciences panel that evaluated BJS programs. He is the current vice president-elect of the American Society of Criminology and co-editor of the Journal of Quantitative Criminology.

Scrivner, a police psychologist, is “a nationally recognized authority on community policing as well as one of the leading experts on a wide range of policing issues, including recruitment, hiring and training,” noted Travis, who served as director of NIJ, the Justice Department’s research arm, during the Clinton Administration.

Scrivner said joining the Obama Administration will allow her to “help advance the agenda of those who value criminal justice research and evidence-based practices.” She is no stranger to the National Institute of Justice, having served as an NIJ Visiting Fellow studying police use of excessive force.

Tucker, a retired New York City police officer, has served in numerous government positions, including Deputy Director for Operations of

Lynch Leads John Jay Parade of Obama Appointees

State of the College Address Cites ‘Breathtaking’ ChangesPresident Travis Calls for New Master Plan to Carry John Jay to 50th Anniversary in 2014

the Justice Department’s Office of Community-Oriented Policing Services and Executive Director of the New York City Commission on Human Rights.

Distinguished Professor James Lynch

John Jay comes as the College is about to begin the multi-year process leading to reaccreditation by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, and launch an initiative to increase retention and graduation rates. Travis said the Master Plan will be the result of a series of “robust discussions” including forums, focus groups, town hall meetings, surveys and “idea walls,” all leading to a document “that reflects our best thinking, our high hopes and our commitment to excellence.”

[For the complete text of the President’s State of the College 2009 address, go online to www.jjay.cuny.edu/Stateofcollege.pdf. To view the five-year “road map” of milestones for the Master Plan, Middle States reaccreditation and retention initiatives, go to www.jjay.cuny.edu/StateoftheCollege_Roadmap.pdf.]

More than 300 supporters and friends of John Jay College joined members of the college com-munity on October 29 for the annual “Educating for Justice” Gala, where Herb Sturz together with Lynn and Jules Kroll were honored for their lifelong contributions to public service and civic betterment.

The gala raised a record-breaking sum in excess of $550,000, including a generous contri-bution of $50,000 by Dick Tarlow, a member of the John Jay College Foundation Board. The pro-ceeds of the evening will benefit various student initiatives.

A former New York City deputy mayor and creator of such programs as the Vera Institute for Justice and The After-School Corporation, Sturz received the Award for Social Entrepreneurship. In presenting the award, Jack Rosenthal, Presi-dent of The New York Times Company Founda-tion, described Sturz as “the most imaginative and effective public policy innovator of our time.”

John Jay President Jeremy Travis said: “Throughout his career, Herb Sturz has embraced a philosophy he calls ‘double or triple social utility’ — working to help one population while helping another. He wrings optimal benefit from every investment of time, money and talent.”

Award-winning journalist Ken Auletta presented the Award for Civic Leadership to Lynn and Jules Kroll for their deep and enduring com-mitment to philanthropy and public service. Jules

Kroll is a pioneering figure in the modern corpo-rate investigative and security industry, while his wife, Lynn, is a veteran leader of numerous non-profit institutions, including the UJA-Federation of New York and the Jewish Board of Family and Children’s Services.

“Jules Kroll has drawn upon his vast experi-ence in his role as chairman of the John Jay

College Foundation, providing superlative leader-ship for the board and the John Jay community,” Travis said.

The gala featured entertainment by Lin-Manuel Miranda, the Tony Award-winning composer and lyricist of the Broadway hit “In the Heights,” and Henry Butler, the legendary New Orleans-based jazz and blues pianist.

Leading New Yorkers Saluted atAnnual ‘Educating for Justice’ Gala

President Travis (right) enjoys a moment during the “Educating for Justice” Gala with (from left) presenter Jack Rosenthal,

honoree Herb Sturz, presenter Ken Auletta, and honorees Jules and Lynn Kroll.

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educating for justice

PRESENTING…MICHAEL PFEIFER (History) presented a paper, “Racial and Class Frontiers: Vigilantism and Criminal Justice in the Late Antebellum United States,” at the Western History Association Conference in Denver on October 9.

HOWARD PFLANZER (Communication and Theatre Arts) co-produced Erotik Politik Cabaret: A Sexual and Political Romp at The Living Theatre in Manhattan on October 25. The production was a series of readings and performance pieces written by Pflanzer and others.

THOMAS A. KUBIC (Sciences) was an invited speaker at the Trace Evidence Symposium sponsored by the National Institute of Justice and FBI in Clearwater Beach, FL, August 2-7. His lecture on “Examination of a 13-Year-Old Crime Scene for a War Crimes Trial, or Is it Ever Too Late to Examine a Crime Scene?” dealt with murders that took place in Rwanda in mid-1990s. Also at the symposium, JOHN A. REFFNER (Sciences) presented a poster concerning his research, conducted with graduate students Vanessa Martinez and Brooke Weinger, on the “Application of Diamond Internal Reflection

JOHN MATTESON (English) was the guest of honor and

featured speaker at an October 9 fundraising luncheon at the

Harriet Beecher Stowe Center in Hartford, CT. Here he poses with

fellow Pulitzer Prize-winning biographers Debby Applegate (left)

and Joan D. Hedrick, who introduced Matteson at the gathering.

Infrared Microscopical Analysis of Mineral and Glass Trace Evidence.” NICHOLAS PETRACO JR. (Sciences) presented a poster on “The Statistical Significance of the Aggregate Trace Evidence Found in Dust Specimens.” DALE PURCELL and REBECCA BUCHT, doctoral students in forensic science who are both laboratory instructors at John Jay, also presented posters on their research.

KIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) delivered a talk titled “How Is the Criminal Justice System Impacting our Community?” at Reality House, Inc., on September 24. Reality House assists individuals, families, veterans and communities in leading productive lives during the re-entry process.

BETWEEN THE COVERSJEREMY TRAVIS (President) and ANNA CRAYTON (Prisoner Reentry Institute) co-authored an article “Offender Reentry” that appears in 21st Century Criminology: A Reference Handbook, Vol.2 (Sage Publications, 2009), edited by J. Mitchell Miller.

PETER MANUEL (Art & Music) recently published three books: Creolizing Contradance in the Caribbean (an edited volume), The Reggae Scene: The People, the Image, the Music (a co-authored children’s book), and Chowtal Rang Bahar: A Treasury of Chowtal Songs from India and the Caribbean (a co-edited anthology of Indo-Caribbean folksongs). His 1988 book Popular Musics of the Non-Western World, earlier translated into Japanese, was recently translated and published in Korean. He is currently working on a video documentary on Indo-Caribbean music.

PETER MOSKOS (Law, Police Science & Criminal Justice Administration) published an article, “From Amsterdam, Lessons on Controlling Drugs — If It’s On the Shelves, It’s Off the Streets,” in the October 25 Washington Post Sunday Magazine. His article “Angels in Blue: The Virtues of Foot Patrol” appeared in the September/October 2009 issue of The American Interest.

JODIE G. ROURE (Latin American/Latina/o Studies) had her book chapter “The NCLB, Race, Ethnicity, Class and Diversity: Creating a High School to Law/Graduate School Pipeline for Underrepresented Students” published in

Our Promise: Achieving Educational Equity for America’s Children (Carolina Academic Press, 2009), edited by Maurice Dyson.

DOROTHY MOSES SCHULZ (Law, Police Science & Criminal Justice Administration), working with Dr. Rita Wirrer of the Unit for International Police Cooperation in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, has created a bibliography of items pertaining to women in policing around the world that may be downloaded from the Police Futurists International Web site, (www.policefuturists.org). The items include books and articles written in English, French, German and Dutch.

PEER REVIEWROBERTA BELLI (Sociology), an adjunct faculty member and a student in the John Jay/CUNY doctoral program in criminal justice, received a National Institute of Justice graduate research fellowship for her dissertation on “Where Terrorists, Far-Right Extremists and Greedy Criminals Meet: A Comparative Study of Financial Crimes in the U.S. The award was one of only six given out this year, and the first federal dissertation award won by a criminal justice PhD student in the 45-year history of the program.

JOCK YOUNG (Sociology) has been named winner of the 2009 Distinguished Book Award presented by the American Society of Criminol-ogy’s Division of International Criminology. He was cited for Cultural Criminology: An Invitation (London Sage, 2008), which he co-authored with Jeff Ferrell and Keith Hayward.

On October 21, John Jay became the first college in New York to host the city’s Disability Mentoring Day, one of the highlights of National Disability Employment Awareness Month.

The day, described by Vice President for Student Development Berenecea Johnson Eanes as “a celebration of able-ism,” was launched with a breakfast ceremony attended by the students who would be shadowing mentors in the Division of Student Development and learning about the different functions and services provided by units in the department.

Chris Rosa, CUNY’s University Assistant Dean of Student Affairs, called the occasion an historic day in which hundreds of people with disabilities citywide would have the opportunity to be mentored. “You will be the next generation of leadership, in part because of mentoring opportunities you receive,” Rosa said, addressing students at the ceremony. “And when you get there, remember to reach back and become a mentor yourself.”

Rosa and Matthew Sapolin, Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, praised John Jay for assuming an unrivaled leadership role in promoting equal access and opportunity. “That campus culture at John Jay begins at the front door,” Sapolin said, praising an unidentified security officer who met him at the entrance to Haaren Hall.

The mentor/mentee relationship is a two-way street, Sapolin emphasized, and one that should lead to expanded horizons in the business and professional world. “We all face obstacles,” he said, “but we have to make the workplace understand that those obstacles are removable.”

John Jay boasts the largest number of military veterans of any student body in the City University system, so the notion of “supporting our troops” comes naturally, during wartime or anytime. In that vein, the College’s Office of Community Outreach, in conjunction with the Veterans Club and Homeland Security Club, has launched a Treats for Troops campaign as a way of bringing relief to military personnel serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The campaign has set up collection sites on campus where volunteers are seeking donations of toiletries and other sundries, baby wipes, anti-fungal creams, socks, non-aspirin pain relievers, food items, holiday candy, “gently used” magazines, books and videogames, phone cards and letters of support. Monetary donations to cover the costs of packaging and shipping are also appreciated.

“The title for our benefit drive, Treats for Troops, is derived from a national organization that delivered thousands of care packages to soldiers all over the world,” said Director of Community Outreach Declan Walsh. “We are hoping to reinstate the Treats for Troops mission of providing relief to soldiers on active duty overseas as a college community.”

Among the John Jay students who have already received care packages from the Treats for Troops effort, Walsh said, are Sgt. Yevgeny

The ancient city of Marrakesh, Morocco, will be the site for John Jay’s Ninth Biennial International Conference, “Societies in Transition: Balancing Security, Social Justice and Tradition,” from June 2-5, 2010.

The conference, presented in partnership with Hassan II University and the Advisory Council on Human Rights of the Kingdom of Morocco, will bring together scholars, practitioners, government leaders, police officials and representatives of international organizations in an effort to promote international and interdisciplinary understanding of justice issues in the broadest sense.

The conference’s program committee, chaired by Professor Chitra Raghavan of the

Department of Psychology, has issued a call for papers soliciting proposals for symposiums, presentations or posters on relevant themes, including legal reform, terrorism, human rights, transnational trafficking in drugs, arms and human beings, financial crimes, gender and social justice, and more.

Proposals should reflect scholarly work and may be submitted in English, French or Arabic. The deadline for submitting abstracts or panel proposals is December 15.

For more information on the conference, go online to www.jjay.cuny.edu/ic, or contact Ken Lewandoski, Director of the Office of International Studies and Programs, at [email protected].

International Conference Heads to Morocco

Gershman, who is serving in Iraq with the 192nd Military Police Battalion, and an unidentified female student who is now on her third tour of duty in Afghanistan.

For more information on the Treats for Troops drive at John Jay, call 646.557.4820, or visit the Office of Community Outreach in Room 3408 North Hall.

Sgt. Yevgeny “Gene” Gershman, one of the beneficiaries of

the Treats for Troops campaign.

Author,Author!

Sociology Professor David Green (right) was in the spotlight at the Book & Author lecture

on October 19 for a discussion of his book When Children Kill Children: Penal Populism and

Political Culture, which was awarded the 2009 Book Prize by the British Society of Criminol-

ogy. Joining Green on the panel were (from left) Distinguished Professor of Criminal Justice

Jock Young and Stephen Handelman, Director of the Center on Media, Crime and Justice.

John Jay’s prominent role in local celebration of Disability Employment Awareness Month got an additional boost when Danielle Officer, interim Director of the College’s Office of Accessibility Services, served as an invited presenter at a program sponsored by the FBI’s New York office. The program, organized around the theme “Expectations + Opportunity = Full Participation,” was attended by FBI staff employees and senior executive management.

College Remembers Its Own with ‘Treats for Troops’ Outreach Effort

John Jay Takes the Lead inCitywide ‘Celebration of Able-ism’

Chris Rosa (seated), the University Assistant Dean of

Student Affairs, chats with President Travis, Danielle Officer

of the John Jay Office of Accessibility Services and Vice

President for Student Development Berenecea Johnson

Eanes at the kickoff ceremony for Disability Mentoring Day.


October 28, 2009

Worth NotingOctober 30 5:30 PM - 9:30 PMMalcolm/King“Fall Back” CelebrationA fundraising evening of music, dancing and refreshments to benefit the Malcolm/King Scholarship FundFor tickets and other information,call 212.237.8117 or [email protected]

Multipurpose Room, North Hall

November 3 5:30 PMCreated Equal: How toReduce Racial Disparity inthe Criminal Justice SystemDr. Barry Krisberg, Visiting Scholar, Center on Race, Crime and Justice

Room 1311, North Hall

November 15 All dayUndergraduate Open HouseGerald W. Lynch Theater

November 18 3:15 AMIndoor Triathlon RelayThe Pool / Cardiovascular Fitness Center

November 18-22 8:00 PMIl Furioso: The Birthof Modern JusticeA dual-language adaptationof Aeschylus’ “Eumenides”Presented by the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts with support from the Department of African American Studies


They’re the newest cadre of student leaders at John Jay: 21 Peer Ambassadors, who represent the College at a variety of functions both on- and off-campus.

By whatever name they are known, Peer Ambassadors are a common sight at many other college campuses, and Vice President for Student Development Berenecea Johnson Eanes made it a priority to create such a program when she arrived at John Jay in July 2006.

“Peer leadership initiatives are very common and very popular,” said Eanes. “People love to hear from students. Contact with Peer Ambassadors can be a very powerful thing.”

Carefully screened, trained and decked out in black blazers with name tags proclaiming their status as Peer Ambassadors, the student leaders are a group that reflects the diversity of the John Jay student body, Eanes pointed out. For one thing, the Vice President noted, their backgrounds are thoroughly international, with roots in the Caribbean Basin, Latin America and West Africa, as well as the New York metropolitan area and surrounding states.

“In a sense, they’re not your typical students leaders, in that new faces have stepped up,” said Dana Trimboli, Eanes’s executive assistant, who oversees the Peer Ambassador program. Trimboli added that the Peer Ambassadors, who must have a 3.0 grade point average just to be considered for the program, undergo two mandatory training workshops per semester, focusing on leadership, assessment, team-building and other skills.

Eanes praised the students’ dedication and energy in working such events as college tours and orientations and the alumni phonathon. Next up for the Peer Ambassadors will be the Undergraduate Open House on November 15. The students’ services are available upon request

by contacting Trimboli.“They’re just great,” said Eanes. “They’re

another potential community here, like our athletes, and they help to make a large school a smaller place.”

One of the Peer Ambassadors, Winderline Petit-Frere, a sophomore Justice Studies major, noted that she has “always been a leader” at other schools she has attended, and her Peer Ambassador duties allow her to continue doing that while making a difference at John Jay. “Everything we do helps me, allows me to help others, and helps me to see things differently,” said Petit-Frere, adding that she hopes to stay in the Peer Ambassador program until she graduates.

José Rosario, a senior majoring in Political Science, said he enjoys helping people and

The recent increase in public concern about the H1N1 influenza virus — swine flu — has the College’s Student Health Center and the Office of Environmental Health and Safety on high alert as a variety of precautions are put in place to minimize the incidence and spread of the disease.

Information is a crucial tool in responding to the H1N1 threat, noted Malaine Clarke, the Director of Student Health Services, and to this end, she and her staff are holding a

series of health-information sessions for the College community. Shailendra Chainani, the Environmental Health and Safety Officer, added that postings on bulletin boards, in classrooms and bathrooms and on the College’s Web site keep the John Jay community up to date on preventive measures, including hand-hygiene practices and “respiratory etiquette.”

To reduce the risk of opportunistic infection, hand-sanitizer dispensers have been installed at key locations throughout the College. “We know

New York’s senior U.S. Senator, Charles Schumer (center), joins members of the John Jay Jay-

walkers before the start of the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure on September 14. Under

team captain Irene O’Donnell, the John Jay delegation, which won an award for the largest

college contingent, included Alumni Association 2nd vice president Teri Coaxum (20313),

who is Schumer’s deputy New York State director; Director of Athletics Dan Palumbo (23282);

Senior Vice President for Finance and Administration Robert Pignatello; President Jeremy

Travis, and members of the John Jay baseball team, among many others.

Walkingthe Walk

As John Jay’s Newest Student Leaders,Peer Ambassadors Help College Shine

showing them how college life is very different from high school. “I’ve had the opportunity to speak in classes as a Peer Ambassador, and when professors know you’re part of a prestigious group like this, they know you’re the tops.” Rosario said he tells fellow students that corporations and other potential employers “don’t necessarily want to know your GPA — they want to know what you’ve achieved in college, and want to see how you present yourself.”

Maria Vidal, a college assistant working with Trimboli, noted that in early November a Peer Ambassador page will be added to the College’s Web site, featuring photos, biographical sketches and other personal information on the Peer Ambassadors, along with blog entries on their activities.

Winderline Petit-Frere (left) and José Rosario are among the 21 Peer Ambassadors whose efforts are making a difference at

John Jay.

College Takes Steps to Mitigate Swine Flu Threatthey are being used,” said Chainani, “because we are already having to refill them.”

The Student Health Center in Room 1292N is usually a beehive of activity, with traffic increasing in October and November due to seasonal flus. Clarke said the emergence of H1N1 could double the center’s workload. The center already provides seasonal-flu vaccines and soon, with assistance from the CUNY Health Services Office and the New York City Department of Health, it will provide free H1N1 vaccine as well, through borough-based clinics.

“We’re getting plenty of calls about swine flu,” Clarke said. “People are concerned, with many of them asking about the vaccine’s effectiveness and safety.”

Citing information from the CUNY health office and government health agencies, Clarke said that people who are considered “high risk” — those who are pregnant, diabetic, have kidney problems or a compromised immune system, or are over 65 —should probably get the H1N1 vaccine.

In addition, Clarke noted, an H1N1 working group comprising key administrative staff and faculty has been formed to develop prevention and response plans.

Basic precautions to prevent the spread of flu virus include:

• Avoid close contact with people who are ill.• If you are ill, keep your distance from others

to protect them from becoming ill as well.

• Cough or sneeze into the crook of your arm or your upper shoulder, not into your hands.

• If using a tissue when coughing or sneezing, immediately dispose of the used tissue in a wastebasket, then wash your hands.

• Wash your hands frequently with soap and water, or sanitize with an alcohol-based hand gel.

• Do not share food, drink or utensils.• Get plenty of sleep.• Be physically active.• Drink plenty of fluids and eat nutritious food. (The Student Health Center provides a full

range of health-related services for John Jay students, from breast cancer awareness to heart health, from smoking cessation to safe sex, and much more. For more information on the activities and services of the Student Health Center, call 212.237.8052.

Medical professionals recommend access to and use of a “swine flu combat kit,”

which includes baby wipes, tissues, hand sanitizer, soap and water, and a non-

invasive digital thermometer.









PRESENTING…ELLEN SEXTON (Library) and MARK MCBETH (English) co-presented at the Georgia Conference on Information Literacy in Savannah, GA on September 26. Their talk, “Justice (through Literacy) for All: Library/English Collaboration & Faculty Development,” described the John Jay Subway Series and how that college literacy initiative subsequently promoted faculty development workshops on Writing Across the Curriculum and information literacy.

MARGARET WALLACE (Sciences) gave a presentation titled “DNA New Frontiers: Identification of Non-Human Biological Material-Botanicals, Bugs & Bacteria” on September 23 at a DNA Symposium sponsored by the New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, Department of Forensic Biology.

ROBERT MCCRIE (Protection Management) was the presenter and seminar leader for “Reinventing the Prison: Linking the Prison to the Community for Lower Recidivism,” as part of a conference held at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland September 21-22. The event, aimed at prison governors and public policy advisors, was sponsored by the university’s School of Sociology and Applied Social Studies. MARK MCBETH (English) presented on a panel “Who’s Telling the Truth? Revisiting an Interrogation of an Accused Child Abuser” on July 7 at the International Association of Forensic Linguists Biennial Conference on Forensic Linguistics/Language and Law. Also in July, McBeth presented “An Alternative to the Common Reading — The Common Denominator: Riding the Subway to Inquiry” at the Writing Program Administrators Conference in Minneapolis, MN. He received a Special Recognition Award at the conference for his article “Memoranda of Fragile Machinery: A Portrait of Shaughnessy as Intellectual-Bureaucrat,” which was published in the Journal of Writing Program Administration.

STACI STROBL (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) recently met with police officials in Novo Mesto, Slovenia,

to discuss forthcoming research on policing Roma (gypsy) populations there. The meeting, which has been featured on the Slovenian police Web site, focused on research that Strobl will commence this November in collaboration with MAKI HABERFELD (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration), along with a John Jay graduate student and a colleague at the University of Maribor, Slovenia.

BETWEEN THE COVERSLARRY SULLIVAN (Library) is the editor-in-chief of the recently published The Sage Glossary of the Social and Behavioral Sciences (Sage Publications, 2009), the first such historical and comparative study of some 2,200 concepts in nine different social and behavioral science disciplines. Professors KAREN TERRY (Criminal Justice) and CYNTHIA MERCADO (Psychology) were among the associate editors of the volume.

SERENA NANDA (Anthropology, emerita) is the author of an anthropological murder mystery, A Gift of a Bride: A Tale of Anthropology, Matrimony and Murder, published recently by Altamira/Rowman and Littlefield, 2009. The mystery, set in an Indian immigrant community in New York City, explores gender inequality, violence against women and immigrant adaptation to American life.

ELISE CHAMPEIL (Sciences), GLORIA PRONI (Sciences) and DANIELLE SAPSE (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) have had their paper “Ab Initio Studies of Receptor Interactions with AMPA and Kainic Acid” published in the September 2009 issue of the Journal of Molecular Modeling. The article discusses the possible impact on forensic psychology of mutations in the receptors.

PEER REVIEWNICHOLAS PETRACO, PETER DIACZUK, THOMAS KUBIC, DALE PURCELL and BROOKE WEINGER (Sciences) and PETER SHENKIN (Mathematics and Computer Science) have been awarded $700,000 by the National Institute of Justice to carry out research on the application of Machine Learning and Statistical Pattern Recognition to toolmarks. Their research is aimed at addressing many of the issues raised in the recent National Academy of Sciences report on the forensic sciences.

MEGHAN DUFFY (Center for the Advancement of Teaching) has received a $250,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Education for her project: “Reading More and Reading More Effectively: The Outcomes of Renting Customized Kindle E-Readers to Increase Undergraduate Students’ Access to Course Materials.”

The National Network for Safe Communities (NNSC), a project spearheaded by John Jay’s Center for Crime Prevention and Control, is already bearing fruit around the country, despite having just been formally launched in June.

Professor David Kennedy, director of the crime prevention center and co-chair of the NNSC along with President Jeremy Travis, pointed out that 45 jurisdictions have joined the network to date. The network and its members are committed to building a new standard of practice aimed at reducing levels of violent crime, eliminating overt drug markets, promoting racial reconciliation between minority communities and

police, and reducing high levels of incarceration.The network includes a Leadership Group

of jurisdictions that have committed to full implementation of two crime-reduction approaches conceived by Kennedy: a gang-violence strategy that was first launched in Boston, MA, in the mid-1990s, and a strategy aimed at overt drug markets, pioneered in High Point, NC.

“The goal of the National Network is to establish these two strategies as default standard practices, and so far there’s tremendous excitement,” Kennedy said. “It’s all a work in progress, which is part of the reason to bring

people together. People are figuring out very powerful ways to adapt this and make it work.”

One such gathering took place on October 13-14, when nearly a score of practitioners and academicians gathered at the College for a symposium sponsored by the crime prevention center, focusing on “Managing Community Interventions.” The symposium was a huge success, said Kennedy, and bodes well for the upcoming first annual NNSC conference, which already has more than 300 people signed up to attend on December 2-3 at the Time Warner Conference Center near the John Jay campus.

“We’re trying, in a larger way, to bring together people who are committed to this,” Kennedy said. “That includes international jurisdictions, too, places in South Korea and Australia, for example. What we’re finding is that the core principles are remarkably transferrable.”

A “first among equals” of the National Network’s core issues, Kennedy said, “is the

A delegation of 125 John Jay faculty members, administrators, graduate students and doctoral candidates is expected to make its presence felt at the annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, to be held in Philadelphia from November 4-7.

The program for this year’s conference is being co-chaired by Professor Joshua Freilich, deputy executive officer of the doctoral program in criminal justice, and focuses on the theme “Criminology and Criminal Justice Policy.” The delegation will once again be led by President Jeremy Travis and will boast more than 60 faculty members, including Distinguished Professors

It has been a busy 2009 for the Center on Race, Crime and Justice, with the fall semester continuing the trend of a crowded calendar of events.

Professor Paul Butler of the George Washington University School of Law, who is co-chair of the Center’s advisory board, highlighted the board’s October 15 meeting with a talk based on his latest book, Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice. Later that day, a reception was held to celebrate the publication of the new Encyclopedia of Race and Crime, co-edited by advisory board member Helen Taylor Greene, a professor at Texas Southern University, and Shaun Gabbidon of Penn State University-Harrisburg, who has been a featured speaker at previous events sponsored by the Center. The encyclopedia includes articles by several John Jay faculty members and doctoral students.

Professor Delores Jones-Brown, the Center’s director, pointed out that advisory board members continue to be active participants in scholarly and professional settings, including a

symposium held in July by the U.S. Department of Justice to mark the 45th anniversary of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a three-day criminal justice conference held at Medgar Evers College, and the activities of the Consortium on Police Leadership in Equity.

The Center is currently hosting its third visiting scholar, Barry Krisberg, president of the National Council of Crime and Delinquency.

“It’s hard to believe that this October marks the fourth anniversary of the Center’s launch,” said Jones-Brown. “Over the past four years, the Center has sponsored or co-sponsored more than 30 colloquia, talks, presentations and interactive events that promote discussion or raise aware-ness about race, crime and justice concerns.”

Such events, Jones-Brown pointed out, have involved faculty and students at all levels — undergraduate, graduate and doctoral — as well as a wide variety of individuals and groups from the community, academia and criminal justice.

In June, the Center co-sponsored, along with the Department of African-American Studies,

James Lynch and Todd Clear.Clear is the current ASC president.The John Jay contingent includes faculty from

the following departments: Criminal Justice, Sociology, Psychology, Anthropology, Political Science, Public Management, Mathematics and Computer Science, and Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration. In addition, representatives from the Library, the Center on Crime Prevention and Control, the Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation Center, the journal Criminal Justice Ethics, and the Office of Honors, Awards and Special Opportunities will be on hand as panel presenters and discussants.

the 2009 Power of One Racial Justice Awards, which recognized individuals who have taken on issues related to race and the criminal justice system and made a difference in how justice is administered, or who have called public attention to race, crime and justice concerns that had long

gone under-addressed.Honored at a ceremony at the College were

the late New Jersey Superior Court Judge Robert E. Francis; Celeste Fitzgerald of New Jerseyans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty; and former New York Post reporter Leonardo Blair.

They’d Rather Be in Philadelphia

matter of promoting racial reconciliation. It’s impossible to ignore and our work on the ground confirms the preeminence of this issue. We know that many in law enforcement have written off entire communities.”

Kennedy commented that he is struck by the extent to which people in law enforcement are now willing to admit that past practice isn’t working, and that despite having the best of intentions, law enforcement has caused enormous harm in the process. “That’s a conversation you couldn’t have had with law enforcement not too long ago.”

With much of the work of the National Network and its member jurisdictions taking place “below the radar,” by Kennedy’s admission, at what point can it be said to have reached a critical mass? “We hope it’s true that we’ll know it when it happens,” he remarked. “But the fact of the matter is we think the country is ready to move in a bold new direction.”

A Busy Year for Center on Race, Crime & Justice

Welcome to John Jay

The latest group of visiting scholars who have found John Jay to be a mecca for their research pursuits got an official wel-

come to the College on October 6 when President Jeremy Travis hosted a reception in their honor. The scholars represent a

variety of academic disciplines and hail from all parts of the United States as well as overseas.

Lots of Buzz for New Safe-Communities Network

DON’T TOUCH THAT REMOTE . .

Financial Aid TV Is Coming!Your video guide to

everything you need

to know about financial aid.


September 16, 2009

Worth NotingSeptember 17 11:00 AMRace and the U.S. ConstitutionA Constitution Day lecture byProfessor Gloria J. Browne-Marshall, Department of Law, Police Scienceand Criminal Justice Administration

Presented by the Center on Race, Crime and Justice, and The Law & Policy Group Inc.

Room 3510 North Hall

September 21 2:00 PMCops and Robbers,Las Vegas StyleJeff Jonas,Entity Analytic Solutions, IBM

Presented by the Center forCybercrime Studies

Room 630 Haaren Hall

September 24 2:00 PM - 4:00 PMThe Coordination of Emergency Services in Italy and the European UnionLecture by Erika de Guttry,Visiting Researcher, Pisa, Italy

Presented by the Christian Regenhard Center for Emergency Response Studies

Room 3510 North Hall

October 7 7:00 PMWhat a Wonderful World!An AutomythographyWritten and performed by Meghan Duffy


Topping-out ceremonies are special events in the construction industry, and the one held on August 27 on 11th Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets was especially significant for John Jay College. The ceremony marked the erection of the final piece of structural steel in the building that will add 620,000 square feet of new space to the College’s midtown campus.

The 13-story building — the largest construction project currently being undertaken by the City University of New York — will include

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has known only three elected incumbents in nearly three-quarters of a century, making the televised Democratic primary debate held at John Jay College on September 1 truly a once-in-a-lifetime event.

Co-sponsored by NY1, and moderated by the TV station’s Dominic Carter, the spirited debate gave the three candidates — Richard Aborn, Leslie Crocker Snyder and Cyrus R. Vance Jr. — a chance to make their case for succeeding Robert M. Morgenthau as district attorney, a post he has held since 1974.

The hour-long debate took place before a lively audience of John Jay students, faculty and staff as well as elected officials and members of

High AchievementCollege Celebrates ‘Topping-Out’ of New Building

a moot court, computer and forensic labs, an outdoor commons, a gallery and lecture halls, along with office and classroom space and other facilities.

“It will accommodate most of the College’s programs that are scattered across four buildings,” CUNY Vice Chancellor Iris Weinshall said at the ceremony. “This is the first time it will create an integrated campus.”

John Jay President Jeremy Travis said the building, designed by Skidmore, Owings &

Merrill and due to be completed in 2011, will be a physical symbol of the “new John Jay.” “The structure will be sheathed in glass, the transparency of which is intended to symbolize the way the justice system should function,” Travis said.

In keeping with industry tradition, the last beam to be hoisted into place was painted white, topped with an American flag and signed by construction workers, project managers and College and University officials.

Above: Signing the final beam for John Jay’s new campus building are (from left) Senior Vice President Robert Pignatello,

President Jeremy Travis, City Council member Gail Brewer, CUNY Vice Chancellor Iris Weinshall, CUNY Executive Vice Chancel-

lor Alan Dobrin, State Dormitory Authority Executive Director Paul Williams, and Turner Construction Senior Vice President

and General Manager Charles Murphy. At right: Workers begin hoisting the flag-decked beam into place.

the West Side community. The candidates were questioned by Carter

and a panel of journalists that included Maggie Haberman of the New York Post, Robert Hardt of NY1 and Errol Louis of the New York Daily News. They responded to questions on topics ranging from the prosecution of former New York Giants football star Plaxico Burress and the Central Park jogger case to the prosecution of drug offenders, alternatives to incarceration and wrongful convictions.

All three candidates previously worked as assistant district attorneys under Morgenthau. There is no Republican candidate in the race, making the winner of the Democratic primary a virtual certainty to succeed him.

DA Hopefuls Take Gloves Offin Televised Debate at John Jay

Moderator Dominic Carter of NY1 (left) fires questions at the Democratic candidates for Manhattan District Attorney

— Leslie Crocker Snyder, Cyrus R. Vance Jr. and Richard Aborn — during their September 1 debate at John Jay.

The Division of Student Development began the 2009-2010 academic year with a number of new faces in key positions, as well as current John Jay staff members in new roles.

Dennis Camacho is one of the new faces, having joined the John Jay College community on July 20 as Director of Student Activities. A veteran of 10 years in higher education administration, Camacho most recently served as Director of Student Activities at New York Institute of Technology.

The man Camacho succeeded as student activities director, Declan Walsh, has taken on the leadership of the division’s new Office of Community Outreach and Service Learning. The office will help students develop their sense of social responsibility through projects in the community and on campus.

Danielle Officer is serving as interim Director of Accessibility Services, charged with refocusing the mission, vision and capabilities of that office to better serve its student clients.

The College’s new Athletic Director, Daniel Palumbo, is a familiar presence on campus, having served as interim Athletic Director since

Transitions in Key Personnel Bring New Look & Energyto Student Development

October 2008, and as baseball coach for the past eight years. Palumbo will preside over a 12-team athletics program that includes five new head coaches.

The division has also welcomed new assistants to the Dean of Students and to the Vice President for Student

Development. Raquel Piazza, who will work with Dean Wayne Edwards, comes to John Jay from St. John’s University, where she was Assistant Director of Admissions. John Leebens, the new assistant to Vice President Berenecea Johnson Eanes, is a recent graduate of Southern Illinois University.

“I am pleased to see all of these talented individuals added to the John Jay family, and am eager to see the impact of their collective skills and experience on our students,” Eanes said.

Athletic Director Dan Palumbo

The new school year bringsnew additions to John Jay’s

faculty ranks as well.See Page 2









PRESENTING…PATRICIA TOVAR (Anthropology) presented a paper on “The Things We Do for Love: Narratives of Women and War in Colombia” at the Latin American Studies Association meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 12.

MARIE UMEH (English) chaired the panel, “Life is Short and Wide: Memoir and Biography in the Diaspora,” and presented a chapter from her biography of Flora Nwapa on July 18 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in New York. The program was televised on C-SPAN/Book TV. Umeh also presented a paper, “How Flora Nwakuche Eliminated Poverty, Created Wealth, and Empowered the People after the Nigerian Civil War,” on August 6 at the Fourth Women in Africa and the African Diaspora International Conference in Abuja, Nigeria.

NATHAN LENTS (Sciences) presented a talk on June 18 titled, “Video Lectures and Online

Office Hours: Teaching Biology through the Internet,” at the Sloan-Consortium Symposium on Emerging Technology for Online Learning, in San Francisco, CA. On June 22, Lents presented a talk on “Teaching the Process of Science in Evolution, Phylogenetics, and Natural Selection,” at the quadrennial conference of the National Association of Paleontology in Cincinnati, OH.

EUGENE O’DONNELL (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) appeared in the documentary, “Shouting Fire: Dispatches from the Edge of Free Speech,” shown on HBO in July, in which he discussed police handling of the 2004 Republican National Convention. The film was also shown earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival.

MICHAEL PFEIFER (History) presented a paper, “Vigilantes, Criminal Justice and Antebellum Cultural Conflict,” at the annual conference of the Society for Historians of the American Republic, held in Springfield, IL, on July 19.

DOROTHY MOSES SCHULZ (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) was the keynote speaker at the Florida Police Chiefs Association’s annual summer training conference in June. She was also the keynote speaker at the Women in Public Safety Communications Leadership Symposium, held in May by the Association of Public Safety Communications Officials in Orlando, FL.

EFFIE COCHRAN (English) followed up on teaching a month-long study abroad course in Thessaloniki, Greece, by moderating a panel at a conference on “Human Rights Learning as Peace Education: Pursuing Democracy in a Time of Crisis,” held from July 26 to August 2 in Budapest, Hungary

BETWEEN THE COVERSKIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) had her article “A Map through the Maze: Achieving Five Years of Arrest-Free Behavior,” accepted for the January/February 2010 issue of Insights, a publication of the Offender Preparation & Education Network Inc.

DANIEL PINELLO (Political Science) published his article, “Location, Location, Location: Same-Sex Relationship Rights by State,” in the September 2009 edition of the American Bar Association’s The Young Lawyer.

JOHN STAINES (English) had his new book The Tragic Histories of Mary Queen of Scots 1560-1690: Rhetoric, Passions, and Political Literature published by Ashgate Publishing in May. His essay “Radical Pity: Responding to Spectacles of Violence in King Lear” appeared in the volume Staging Pain, 1580-1800: Violence and Trauma in British Theater, also published this summer by Ashgate.

DOROTHY MOSES SCHULZ (Law, Police

Science and Criminal Justice Administration) recently authored Becoming a Police Officer (New York: Learning Express), aimed at high school and college students who are interested in police careers. She also contributed to the Encyclopedia of Race & Crime (Sage Reference, 2009), with entries on Lee P. Brown, Ella Bully-Cummings, The Guardians, Beverly Harvard and Benjamin Ward.

PATRICK COLLINS (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) has had his book Negotiate to Win (Sterling Publishing, 2009) translated into Portuguese in Brazil by Elsevier.

ANDREW MAJESKE (English) published an article in the journal Law and Literature this summer titled “Equity’s Absence: The Extremity of Claudio’s Prosecution and Bernardine’s Pardon in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure.”

PEER REVIEWERIN ACKERMAN (Political Science), TIM MCCORMACK (English), DARA BYRNE (Communication and Theater Arts) and ROS MYERS (Sociology) were selected to participate in CUNY’s highly competitive 2009-2010 University Seminar on Teaching and Learning in Undergraduate Education. Of 70 applications to the program, 15 faculty members were chosen, including the four from John Jay — the most of any college.

The fall 2009 semester saw John Jay welcome 36 new full-time faculty members in 14 academic departments. These latest additions include specialists to support the newest majors in Economics, English, Gender Studies and Global History.

President Jeremy Travis called the investment in new faculty “a critical building block of a revitalized John Jay College.” The College has compiled an outstanding track record of recruiting top-choice candidates in a competitive market, Travis said, attracting new faculty who “come from premier doctoral programs around the world, are committed to excellence in scholarship and teaching, and are eager to join the John Jay community.”

The most recent additions to the faculty, along with their terminal degrees, granting institutions and areas of specialization, are:

AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDIESJessica Gordon Nembhard, associate professor;

PhD, University of Massachusetts (political economics)

ANTHROPOLOGYAbby Stein, associate professor; PhD, CUNY

Graduate Center (criminal psychopathology)

ART AND MUSICBenjamin Bierman, assistant professor; PhD,

CUNY Graduate Center (jazz composition)Cyriaco Lopes, assistant professor; MFA,

University of Maryland (imaging and digital arts)

COMMUNICATION AND THEATRE ARTSDana Tarantino, associate professor; PhD,

New York University (stage directing/arts partnerships)

ECONOMICSGeert Dhondt, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Massachusetts (political economics/economic history)

Michael Meeropol, visiting associate professor; PhD, University of Wisconsin (macroeconomic policy)

Catherine P. Mulder, assistant professor; PhD, University of Massachusetts (labor economics)

ENGLISHAlexa Capeloto, assistant professor; MS,

Columbia University (journalism)Yasmin Dalisay, lecturer;MFA, Sarah Lawrence

College (writing and composition)Lesley Alan Hansen, lecturer; PhD, Columbia

University (writing)Veronica C. Hendrick, assistant professor; PhD,

CUNY Graduate Center (literature and law)Sanjana Nair, lecturer; MFA, New York University

(poetry/creative writing)

Tara Pauliny, assistant professor; PhD, Ohio State University (writing/composition/feminist rhetoric)

Jay Walitalo, lecturer; MA, University of Illinois (creative writing)

Claudia Zuluaga, lecturer; MFA, Sarah Lawrence College (creative writing/fiction)

HISTORYJames DeLorenzi, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Pennsylvania (Italian studies)David P.D. Munns, assistant professor; PhD, Johns

Hopkins University (history of science, sexuality and religion)

LAW, POLICE SCIENCE AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE ADMINISTRATION

Martin F. Horn, distinguished lecturer; MA, John Jay College of Criminal Justice (corrections and probation)

LIBRARYMarta Bladek, assistant professor; MS, Rutgers

University (reference)

MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTER SCIENCEJohn Bryk, assistant professor; PhD, Rutgers

University (number theory/cryptology)Shamik Sengupta, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Central Florida (applied mathematics/game theory/network security)

Keith B. Thomas, lecturer; MS, CUNY Graduate

Faculty Ranks Swell with 36 Newest AdditionsCenter (photochemistry/mathematics education)

PHILOSOPHYJames DiGiovanna, assistant professor; PhD,

Stony Brook University (ethics and aesthetics)

POLITICAL SCIENCESamantha Majic, assistant professor; PhD, Cornell

University (gender and American politics and public policy)

Maxwell H.H. Mak, assistant professor; PhD, Stony Brook University (judicial decision-making)

Yuksel Sezgin, assistant professor; PhD, University of Washington (human rights/Middle Eastern and South Asian affairs)

PROTECTION MANAGEMENTBethany L. Brown, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Delaware (disaster planning, response and recovery)

PSYCHOLOGYPreeti Chauhan, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Virginia (clinical psychology)Hyewon Chung, assistant professor; PhD,

University of Texas at Austin (educational psychology)

Silvia Lorena Mazzula, assistant professor; PhD, Columbia University (counseling psychology)

Ching-Fan Sheu, professor; PhD, New York University (experimental psychology)

Peggilee Wupperman, assistant professor; PhD, University of North Texas (clinical psychology)

PUBLIC MANAGEMENTCarmen R. Apaza, assistant professor; DPA,

American University (public administration)Salomon Alcocer Guajardo, associate professor;

PhD, University of Pittsburgh (financial management/budgeting)

Yi Lu, associate professor; PhD, University of Georgia (performance management/budgeting)

William J. Pammer Jr., associate professor; PhD, University of Oklahoma (public policy and city/county management)

Adam Wandt, instructor; JD, Hofstra University (e-government/homeland security/information literacy)

SCIENCESAngelique Corthals, assistant professor; DPhil,

University of Oxford (forensic anthropology)Albert Harper, distinguished lecturer; PhD,

University of Connecticut (crime scene reconstruction/law and forensic science)

Marcel Roberts, assistant professor; PhD, Boston College (spectroscopy/biomedical engineering)

SOCIOLOGYJana Arsovska, assistant professor; DCrim,

Catholic University of Leuven (criminology)Richard E. Ocejo, assistant professor; PhD, CUNY

Graduate Center (urban/cultural sociology)

Welcome, John Jay Class of 2013!

Some 1,600 new baccalaureate students got their official welcome to John Jay last month during a two-day Freshman Orien-

tation that included opportunities for parents to take their concerns straight to the top, at a reception hosted by President

Jeremy Travis (photo at right, top), and for students to meet one of the newest members of the College’s leadership team,

Dean of Undergraduate Studies Anne Lopes (right, bottom). The 4th-floor gymnasium (above) became a virtual bazaar of

services, options and opportunities available to new students, with orientation leaders and newly trained “Peer Ambassa-

dors” rising to the challenge of making the students’ transition to college life a smooth one.


August 26, 2009

Worth NotingSeptember 1 6:45 PMPrimary Debate of the Democratic Candidates for Manhattan District AttorneyRichard Aborn, Leslie Crocker Snyder and Cyrus Vance Jr.Moderated by Dominic Carter

Admission by ticket only. Contact the Office of Student Activities for tickets.


September 10 2:00 PM – 4:00 PMBarack, Hip Hop and Beinga Black Male in AmericaDiscussion and book signing with Kevin Powell, author of The Black Male Handbook: A Blueprint for Life

Gerald W. Lynch Theater Lobby

September 16 6:00 PM – 8:15 PMFree Performance bythe Ailey II Dance CompanyContact the Office of Student Activities or the Provost’s Office for tickets.


The wealth of academic offerings at John Jay is gleaming even more brightly at the start of the fall 2009 semester, with the launch of two new majors: Bachelor of Arts degrees in Gender Studies and Global History.

John Jay will be the first City University institution to offer a BA in Gender Studies. The 36-credit interdisciplinary major will build on the minor in Gender Studies that the College has offered since 1997, including such courses as Sex and Culture, Women and Terrorism, Sex Offenders in the Criminal Justice System, History of Gender Images, Manhood in America and many others.

The major will be taught by a core group of nearly four dozen full-time faculty members representing 14 academic departments who have strong records of scholarship in Gender Studies. Their expertise covers a range of issues including antidiscrimination law, hate crimes, intimate-partner violence, sexuality and sexual identity in popular culture, stalking and sexual harassment.

The new major is already generating buzz in academic circles, with one prominent outside reviewer describing it as “an integrated, coherent and solid major — and one that is targeted to the already developed strengths in criminal justice at John Jay.”

“I’ve rarely seen [a major] as inclusive and well-thought-out as yours,” said the reviewer, Professor Michael Kimmel, a professor at SUNY’s Stony Brook campus and editor of the journal Men and Masculinities.

The Global History major is believed to be among the first of its kind in the United States, and with it John Jay becomes one of just a handful of institutions to provide students with a background in the new historiographic approach of global history, which emphasizes the connections between and among civilizations.

The new John Jay program differs from tradi-tional undergraduate world-history majors, which are organized according to region, by giving students the chance to master the history of the world during a particular chronological era.

As with the new Gender Studies major, the Global History major has already won the endorsement of independent reviewers. Professor

Joshua B. Freeman, Executive Officer of the PhD program in history at the CUNY Graduate Center, said the new major “represents the forefront in thinking among historians about how to understand and teach about the history

of the world…. In stressing global interactions, large historical processes and broad themes, the proposed major adopts a highly sophisticated approach to teaching world history, [one that is] ambitious yet manageable.”

With a New Dean on Board, John Jay Launches Two New Undergraduate Majors

In a bit of serendipitous timing, the newest baccalaureate majors in Gender Studies and Global History will be overseen by a new Dean of Undergraduate Studies whose scholarly track record covers both fields.

Dr. Anne Lopes, who assumed the deanship in late July, holds a PhD in political science from Freie Universität in Berlin, Germany, and is widely published on topics relating to gender, feminism and the women’s movement in late 19th-century Germany.

Lopes succeeds José Luis Morín, who had held the post on an interim basis for the past two years. Lopes most recently served as Associate Dean at Empire State College (SUNY), where her responsibilities included curriculum development, supervision of adjunct faculty members, and student academic and support services.

“As John Jay embarks on a period of strategic planning and self-study and prepares to launch a retention initiative, Dr. Lopes’ experience and abilities will serve us well,” said Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs Jane Bowers, noting that Lopes led similar initiatives at Empire State and her previous institution, Metropolitan College of New York.

Lopes, who said she has been struck by the helpful and welcoming atmosphere that greeted her arrival, noted the campus-wide buzz surrounding “the innovative new programs showcasing the synergy of criminal justice and the liberal arts, the plans for hiring new faculty at the leading edges of their

fields, and the deepening conversation about sharpening our focus on student success.”

According to Lopes, “John Jay has developed incredible momentum in its global mission of Educating for Justice, from the energy and diversity of students in first-year learning communities to the productivity that comes from the sustained promotion of faculty and student research. There’s still much work to do, which makes it an extraordinary and exciting time to be the Undergraduate Dean. I very much look forward to my first academic year here and to contributing to the continued improvement of undergraduate education.”

Dean of Undergraduate Studies Seeksto Build on Campus-Wide Momentum

A coalition of more than 50 leading criminal justice officials and scholars representing 30 jurisdictions throughout the United States has banded together under the aegis of John Jay’s Center for Crime Prevention and Control to create the National Network for Safe Communities (NNSC).

The National Network was formally launched June 15 at a press conference held during the annual meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Providence, RI.

President Jeremy Travis, who serves as the NNSC’s co-chair, said the coalition’s members are “all committed to building a new standard of practice aimed at reducing violent crime, eliminating overt drug markets, promoting racial reconciliation between minority communities and law enforcement and reducing high levels of incarceration.”

The chief architect of these crime-reduction strategies is Professor David Kennedy, who is Director of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control and co-chair of the NNSC. “These strategies work,” Kennedy said. “We’ve been

losing whole generations of young people to the streets, prison or murder, and we simply don’t have to live with that any longer.”

Kennedy’s crime-reduction strategies, pioneered in Boston, MA, in the mid-1990s, have since been adapted successfully in High Point, NC, Cincinnati, OH, and Hempstead, NY. At the press conference, officials from these localities and others spoke glowingly about the NNSC approach.

Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory said that city’s version of the Network’s strategy “has not only reduced group-related homicides, but it has helped many formerly violent individuals escape the cycle of violence and turn their lives around.” In Hempstead, which had the worst open-air drug market in Nassau County, the NNSC strategy led to a 74-percent decrease in crime and an 87-percent drop in drug arrests.

A Leadership Group has been created within the NNSC to help further develop the anti-crime strategies and share experiences and insights with the network. The group currently includes Boston,

MA, Police Commissioner Ed Davis, Cincinnati Police Chief Col. Tom Streicher, High Point Police Chief James Fealy, Los Angeles, CA, Police Chief William Bratton, Providence Police Chief Col. Dean Esserman, and Milwaukee, WI, Police Chief Ed Flynn, a John Jay alumnus (MA, 1976).

The National Network’s first annual conference will be held Dec. 2-3 in New York City. For more information on the NNSC, visit www.nnscommunities.org.

One current John Jay student, one former student, two glittering success stories.

Victoria Oyaniran, a student in the Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement Pro-gram, recently learned of her selection as one of the 2009 winners of a $10,000 fellowship presented by the Education Fund of the Women’s Forum Inc. of New York.

The Women’s Forum, an organization of prominent women in the professions, arts and business, presents annual grants to mature women who, after a break in their education, are pursuing under-graduate degrees.

Oyaniran, who has been active in the John Jay student government, the African Student Association and the Alpha Phi Sigma honor society, was “quite deserving” of the Women’s Forum award, said Marlon Daniels of the Office of Student Activities.

In April, Oyaniran was honored at the Service Learning and Civic Engagement Awards Lun-cheon with the Keith L.T. Wright Service Award.

Meanwhile, an ocean away, former Justice Scholar and Honors Program student Joseph Simone Jr. wrapped up the requirements for an MPhil degree from Cambridge University, with the help of a $15,000 scholarship provided by the John Jay College Foundation.

Simone said the Honors Program at John Jay had prepared him well for his studies at Cambridge. He cited his undergraduate mentor, criminal justice Professor Joshua Freilich, as having been an “engaging and thoughtful supervisor” when they worked together on a government-funded study of right-wing extremism in the United States.

Victoria Oyaniran

Joseph Simone Jr.

Onward & Upward for High Achievers

Crime Prevention Center SpearheadsNational Network for Safe Communities

Joined by local elected officials from around the country, and with President Jeremy Travis (left)

looking on, Professor David Kennedy fields reporters’ questions at the press conference held to

formally launch the National Network for Safe Communities.

Dean of Undergraduate Studies Anne Lopes









Building on the rousing success of its inaugural effort in 2008, the second annual Bravo! Employee Summer Institute was held July 1-2, once again earning rave reviews from the hundreds of John Jay employees who took part in professional and personal development workshops, social networking opportunities and entertainment offerings.

Organized and presented by the Department of Human Resources, the Summer Institute this year included the presentation of the John Jay Employee of the Year Award to Kathy Killoran of the Office of Undergraduate Studies.

The presentation of the Employee of the Year honor was conducted by Provost and Senior Vice President Jane Bowers, who spoke glowingly of Killoran’s 19 years with John Jay, the last three of which have been as Academic Director of Undergraduate Studies.

In accepting the award, Killoran praised the energy, collegiality and friendliness of her John Jay co-workers. From the very start, she said, she has gotten “great satisfaction in improving the educational experience for our students.”

The Summer Institute, subtitled “Excellence in Customer Service: How Do We Get There?” featured dozens of small-group sessions led by in-house experts as well as outside specialists. Participants could learn how to manage their money and their time, deal with difficult co-workers or customers, improve their public-speaking technique, learn the art of forensic sketching, or run various computer programs or

electronic devices.Each day included a complimentary

continental breakfast and lunch. The first day’s luncheon featured the Soft Rock Café, with an acoustic musical performance by Peter Dodenhoff of the Office of Marketing and Development and Senior Vice President Robert Pignatello.

Making things happenTwo weeks prior to the Summer Institute,

18 John Jay employees who have gone the extra mile with creative problem-solving and superior customer service were honored as the latest divisional winners of the Bravo! Employee Recognition Awards.

“The College is in a stronger position than it was at the beginning of the year,” said Pignatello

at the breakfast ceremony on June 18. “You made it happen.”

The newest Bravo! honorees, who were intro-duced by their respective vice presidents, are: Meilisa Arlt (Facilities Management), Johanna Carlin (Theater), Sherry Gibson (Information Technology), Stacey Grant (Health Office), Jerylle Kemp (Alumni Relations), Leanne Mehno (Coun-seling), Alexander Pizarro (Registrar), Nicole Rios (One-Stop Center), Felice Shoot (Counseling), Marina Shturmina (Institutional Research), Jessica Usera (Health Office), Tomas Vallejo (Mailroom), Richard Van Patten (Media Services), Doreen Viñas (Public Relations), Cherryanne Ward (Spon-sored Programs), Nika Whitehead (Fire Science Institute), Fay Williams (Graduate Admissions) and Nakisha Williams (Institutional Research).

Three broadly experienced professionals took the reins of key positions in the College over the summer.

Christopher Trucillo, a former top official with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Police Department (PAPD) was chosen to head the newly renamed Department of Public Safety at John Jay.Trucillo’s long career with the PAPD included overseeing security operations at Newark International Airport and the Port Authority Bus Terminal, as well as commanding the department’s internal affairs unit. He retired from the agency as its highest-ranking uniformed executive, Chief of Department.

One of the first official acts for Trucillo, who holds a master’s degree in criminal justice from Rutgers University, was to preside over a graduation ceremony for the first class of officers

PRESENTING…KIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) delivered a talk on “How Addicts Can Develop Character” to patients at the Addiction Institute of New York at Roosevelt Hospital on July 20. She addressed the importance of integrating aspects of critical thinking as a means of positive reintegration into society after drug treatment.

ANN A. HUSE (English) presented a talk on “Monmouth County Sites in Philip Freneau’s Poetry” to the Atlantic Highlands Historical Society in New Jersey on May 20.

HOWARD PFLANZER (Communication and Theatre Arts) presented a lecture with video clips, “Jerzy Grotowski, Judith Malina and The Living Theatre and Alternative Theatre in the U.S.”

under the auspices of The Theatre of the 8th Day as part of the Malta International Theatre Festival in Poznan, Poland, on June 25.

ELLEN SCRIVNER (John Jay Leadership Academy) moderated a panel on “Information Sharing Across Federal, State and Local Levels” at Attorney General Eric Holder’s Law Enforcement Summit in Washington, DC, on April 20. LORIE NICHOLAS (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) delivered a presentation on prisoner re-entry at the “Safe in Our Brothers’ Arms”: Black Male Mental Health and Wellness Symposium held at John Jay on May 1. The event was hosted by the New York Association of Black Psychologists.

BETWEEN THE COVERSMICHAEL PFEIFER (History) published an article, “The Origins of Postbellum Lynching: Collective Violence in Reconstruction Louisiana,” in the Spring 2009 issue of the journal Louisiana History.

ANDREW MAJESKE (English) had his new book Justice, Women, and Power in English Renaissance Drama published in June by Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. The edited collection includes Majeske’s essay “Striking a Deal: Portia’s

Trial Strategy in Shakespeare’s ‘Merchant of Venice.’” NIVEDITA MAJUMDAR (English) had her edited book The Other Side of Terror: Writings on Terrorism in South Asia published by Oxford University Press earlier this year.

PEER REVIEWDAVID GREEN (Sociology) attended the British Society of Criminology conference in Cardiff, Wales, in late June, where he received the society’s 2009 Book Prize for When Children Kill Children: Penal Populism and Political Culture.

JANE KATZ (Health and Physical Education) recently competed with the USA Masters Swim Team at the 18th World Maccabiah Games in Israel, where she won 10 first-place gold medals and three silver medals. Katz, who has participated in the Maccabiah Games since 1957, had the opportunity to meet Olympic gold medalist Jason Lezak (see photo, right), who lit the torch at Ramat Gan Stadium to open the Maccabiah Games.

DIANA FRIEDLAND (Sciences) was awarded a three-year, $415,665 National Science Foundation research grant for her proposal “Pokeweed Antiviral Protein selection of mRNA;

Effects of mRNA structure and initiation factors.” The research, funded by the NSF’s Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, Genes and Genome Systems, is aimed at increasing the understanding of viral infections and how they affect protein synthesis, potentially leading to new anti-viral approaches.

PAUL BRENNER (Media Services) has been elected a member of the Online Film Critics Society.

to be hired and trained under the renamed department. The 11 new public safety officers completed an 80-hour course of instruction prior to being deployed on campus.

Money mattersThe task of managing a broad array of

financial matters will now be in the hands of Gerald Garvey, who began work as John Jay’s new Bursar on July 20.

Garvey, a certified public accountant with 25 years of public accounting experience, recently assisted the College in a review of bursar operations. He brings to the bursar’s position a strong background in financial management, best practices in financial accounting, and establishing and maintaining strong internal controls.

“He is the ideal candidate to lead the Bursar’s Office through the implementation of the CUNY First system and will become an integral part of improved student services,” said Patricia Ketterer, the Executive Director of Finance and Business Services.

One sharp ’raiserJames Sheridan also joined the John Jay

community on July 20, as the new Director of Development.

Sheridan, who holds an MBA in marketing and accounting from Fordham University, comes to John Jay from the Institute of Student Achievement, a nonprofit organization that helps public high schools improve student performance. As director of development there, he increased fund-raised income by 50 percent in three years and secured a number of major gifts from corporate benefactors. Previously, he served as director of corporate and governmental relations at the International Longevity Center, an affiliate of the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine.

“In both development positions he has held, James has built the organization’s fund-raising program while mobilizing support for the organization among board members, donors and other external constituents. These are precisely the skills John Jay needs as we build our private fund-raising capability,” said Vice President for Marketing and Development Vivien Hoexter.

John Jay Says ‘Bravo!’ to Employees

Kathy Killoran of the Office of Undergraduate Studies (photo left) offers reflections and thanks after winning the 2009

Outstanding Employee of the Year Award. Divisional winners of the Bravo! Employee Recognition Awards were joined by

President Travis and the College’s vice presidents as they were honored at a June 18 breakfast ceremony (photo right).

Three Key Positions FilledNew Public Safety Director, Bursar,Development Director Join College Ranks

The newest members of the Department of Public Safety received their certificates

recently upon completing 80 hours of basic training.

Popular ScienceOne of New York’s Finest (above) does a double-take

after spotting a “blood-soaked body” dumped on his beat

in Washington Square Park June 14. The “body” was a

training mannequin that was part of The CSI Experience,

a popular feature of the World Science Festival Street

Fair that was run by forensic science faculty members

and students from John Jay, including Peter Diaczuk

(left), training director for the Center for Modern Forensic

Practice. Visitors to the hands-on exhibit could evaluate

a crime scene, identify trace evidence, compare ballistic

evidence, collect fingerprints and learn about DNA analysis.

Professor Linda Chiu Rourke served as team leader, working

with colleagues and student volunteers to assemble the

exhibit in just over a week.


May 13, 2009

Worth NotingMay 15 8:00 AM - 6:00 PM5th Annual Forensic Psychology MA Student Research ConferenceFor more information, visit http://sites.google.com/a/jjay.cuny.edu/msrg/


May 21 & 22 8:15 AM - 5:00 PM4th Annual National Conference: Men & Women Coming Together to Stand Up and Speak Out to End Violence Against WomenFor more information, visitwww.acalltomen.org, or email Jessica Greenfield, [email protected]

Various locations, Haaren Hall

May 26 5:00 PMCommencementAwards CeremonyGerald W. Lynch Theater

May 27 6:00 PMHonorary DegreeRecipients’ DinnerOffice of the President

May 27 7:00 PM -11:00 PM3rd Annual Night of the Stars:A Celebration to Honorthe Graduating Class of 2009(Event limited to members ofthe graduating class.)

6th Floor, Haaren Hall

May 28 10:30 AM & 3:00 PM2009 Commencement CeremoniesThe Theater at Madison Square Garden

John Jay students had their day in court on April 9 and made the most of the opportunity, sweeping first through fourth places in the annual CUNY-wide Moot Court Competition held at Fordham University Law School.

The four medal-winning students were part of a field of 15 — eight of them from John Jay — in

the Moot Court Competition.“How spectacular!” said President Jeremy

Travis. “This is a great tribute to our students, and to our nascent pre-law program. And thanks to our coaches for doing a great job.”

“First place I can take no credit for,” said Professor Martin Wallenstein, Chair of the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts, who was one of the coaches. Referring to Ryan Wade, who won the competition for the second consecutive year, Wallenstein said, “He knows more law than most of the attorneys here.”

Wallenstein was assisted in the coaching efforts by Rosemarie Maldonado, Counsel to the President; Sylvia Montalban, Assistant Counsel; and Michael Liddie, Deputy Labor Designee.

“It was a lot of work,” Wallenstein said. “These students really had to push themselves.” The students had just a month to prepare. “It was fast and intense,” said Wallenstein. “My

philosophy in coaching is to work them so hard in practice that the competition seems a breeze.”

In addition to Wade, John Jay’s other award-winning moot court competitors were senior Najah Gall, who took second place, sophomore Tricia Lewis, who finished third, and senior Beruryah Batyehudah, who finished fourth. “Tricia Lewis really worked and really came through,” Wallenstein noted. “She worked her way into the medals.”

The competition was done “blind,” meaning that the judge — former Manhattan prosecutor Anne B. Rudman, who is now an attorney in private practice — had no idea what school the students represented until the competition and the judging were completed.

“I’m proud of our students,” said Wallenstein. “They won because our classes at John Jay gave them a great background and because they prepared very well.”

John Jay students have plenty of reasons to smile after trouncing the competition in the annual CUNY-wide Moot Court

Competition. From left, first-place finisher Ryan Wade, Najah Gall (2nd place), moot court judge Anne B. Rudman, Beruryah

Batyehudah (4th place) and Tricia Lewis (3rd place).

Oyez! Oyez! Oh Yes!John Jay Students Have their Day in Courtat CUNY-wide Moot Court Competition

Speaker after speaker at an April 23 awards luncheon urged a spirited group of John Jay students and visitors from Roosevelt High School in Yonkers to discover their purpose and to focus on “perseverance, goals and outcomes” in making their mark on society.

The Service Learning and Civic Engagement Awards Luncheon was co-sponsored by the John Jay African-American Studies Department, the Black Male Initiative and the Connecting Class-room to Community program. Before joining John Jay students and faculty for lunch, the 40 high school students spent the day getting a firsthand look at what John Jay had to offer, including a CSI-type demonstration courtesy of the forensic science faculty.

“Each of you has a purpose,” said Profes-sor Kwando Kinshasa of the African-American Studies Department. “It’s up to you to find it out through investigation and experience, and then use it to make a major change in this world.”

Basil Smikle Jr., a political consultant and for-mer top aide to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, offered an interactive keynote talk in which he stressed the importance of perseverance. “I want to help you get to a place where you can walk in the door and get whatever you want… . People may tell you it’s not your time or your place, but there should be nothing stopping you.”

In a closing “pay it forward” admonition, Smikle reminded the students, “As you go out

and start demanding your place in this world, remember that there are other folks you can lend a helping hand to.”

Five John Jay students were presented with Excellence in Academic Writing awards: Kirill Yemelyantsev, Bryant Duell, JaJa Grays, Amy Diallo and Shanelle McIntosh.

New York State Assemblyman Keith L. T. Wright made a special appearance at the luncheon to present the service award that bears his name. “There’s no greater calling than service learning and civic engagement,” said Wright, who has represented Harlem in the Assembly since1992. He presented the Keith L. T. Wright Service to Victoria Oyaniran, a student in the Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achieve-ment Program.

From left: Basil Smikle Jr., Professor Lori Martin, director of

the Connecting Classroom to Community program, Victoria

Oyaniran, and Assemblyman Keith L.T. Wright.

Students Learn About Service fromThose Who Have Been There, Done That

All Aboard at the Jay StopNew Student-Centered WebPresence Makes Its Debut

The home page of the new Jay Stop, where John Jay students can find a wealth

of information and interactive features geared to their needs and interests.

There’s a new place on campus for John Jay students to hang out: the Jay Stop, a new component of the College Web site that offers a broad range of features geared specifically to student interests and information needs.

The Jay Stop was unveiled on May 11 in what developers described as a “soft launch” — the core of the new site and many of its features made their debut, with more ex-pected to roll out in the weeks ahead. Among the features are RSS feeds from the John Jay calendar, links to TV, radio and news outlets on campus, a section on personal money management, “Learning Essentials,” and “My JJay,” a controlled-access feature allowing students to track their course schedules, transcripts, bursar information and more.

“The goal of the Jay Stop is to build community among the students through the use of technology,” said Vice President for Student Development Berenecea Johnson Eanes. “Student Council President Shaheen Wallace, as part his election platform, made a commitment to more efficient communications with students. Through the efforts of the Department of Information Technology and the staff of the Office of Student Activities, such a means has been created, and we look forward to seeing how this tool can be developed to service our students even more.”

Ana Giron of the Department of Information Technology (DoIT), the architect and designer of the Jay Stop, credited students with much of the impetus for the new site, including the name itself. As the site evolved over a two-month period, various features were tested and modified through the use of student focus groups. “We went into the focus groups with certain assumptions, and were surprised by some of what we learned,” said Giron. The students, she said, felt they were lacking basic information about their school, as well as a sense of community.

The new site will include a self-managed section for the John Jay student government and a provision for user feedback. Developers also hope to be able to create the means for students to upload their own content to the video section of the Jay Stop. There will also be a “Who’s Who” feature, an “Of Interest Around Campus” section and a page simply titled “Free Stuff” — a rundown of no-charge things to enjoy on campus. Poten-tial students can also visit the site to get a sense of what campus life at John Jay is like.









PRESENTINGBENJAMIN LAPIDUS (Music and Art) performed his recent work Herencia Judía on March 29 at the Eldridge Street Museum in Manhattan. On April 4, he performed with his Latin jazz band Sonido Isleño at the Bronx Library Center.

ELLEN BELCHER (Library) was a panelist on the Feminist Archaeologist Panel at the Brooklyn Museum’s Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art on March 14. The panel was presented in conjunction with the Fertile Goddess in the Herstory Gallery, an exhibit that runs through May 31, for which Belcher was a consultant.

PETER MOSKOS (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) spoke on the Baltimore Ghetto at the Yale University Urban Ethnography Project Mini-Conference, “The Urban Ghetto: Then and Now,” during the Eastern Sociological Society’s annual meeting in Baltimore, MD, on March 20.

BETTINA CARBONELL (English) presented a paper on “Bearing Witness in Twenty-First Century Museum Practice“ at the Curating Difficult Knowledge conference held April 16-18 at Concordia University in Montreal.

M. VICTORIA PÉREZ-RÍOS (Government)

presented “Back to the Future: Accountability for Past Abuses in Consolidated Democracies“ at the New York State Political Science Association Conference, which took place at John Jay on April 24-25. She also chaired the panel on Current Issues of International Relations

MARTIN WALLENSTEIN (Communication and Theatre Arts) presented two papers at the centennial meeting of the Eastern Communication Association (ECA) from April 22-26 in Philadelphia. The first, titled “Freedom of Speech 1909-1919: The Dark Decade,” was an invited paper. The second, “The Big Chill: First Amendment and the War on Terror,” was peer-reviewed and received an award as Top Paper in Communication Law and Ethics. Wallenstein was also elected chairperson of the ECA Communication Law and Ethics Interest Group.

JOHN STAINES (English) gave a paper on “Violence and Generic Experiment in Thomas Nashe’s The Unfortunate Traveller” at the meeting of the Renaissance Society of America in Los Angeles on March 21. He also attended the Shakespeare Society of America conference in Washington, DC, where on April 11 he presented a paper on religious controversial prose of the 1590s, “Comic Violence” and “Martin’s Reforming Word in the Marprelate Tracts.”

HOWARD PFLANZER (Communication and Theatre Arts) had a staged reading of his play Living with History: Camus Sartre De Beauvoir presented May 5 and 6 at the Medicine Show Theatre in Manhattan.

STEPHEN HANDELMAN (Center on Media, Crime and Justice) delivered a talk on “How do Organized Criminals Hijack State Activities?” at a special seminar on organized crime and corruption hosted by the RAND Corporation in Arlington, VA, on May 1.

ADINA SCHWARTZ (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) made a Continuing Legal Education presentation, “Biting the Bullet: Challenging Firearms Evidence,” as part of the Fifth Annual Indigent Criminal Defense Seminar: Advanced Skills for the Experienced Practitioner, sponsored by the Supreme Court of Virginia and the Virginia State Bar, in Richmond, VA, on April 3.

KIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) recently spoke to a group of female inmates who are enrolled in the Going Out by Going In prisoner reentry program at the Century Regional Detention Facility in Los Angeles. In addition, she spoke to 35 at-risk youth in the Vital Intervention Directional Alternative program at the Lennox Station campus in Watts.

DELORES JONES-BROWN (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) served on a panel titled “Prosecutorial Discretion: From Mistake to Misconduct,” sponsored by the Diversity Committee of the New Jersey State Bar Association. Other invited talks include “Police Brutality: In the 10 Years Since the Death of Amadou Diallo” for the Women’s City Club of New York, and a presentation at the Russell Sage Foundation for the Consortium for Police Leadership in Equity.

BETWEEN THE COVERSDAVID KENNEDY (Anthropology) has had his article “Drugs, Race and Common Ground: Reflections on the High Point Intervention“ published in the March 2009 issue of NIJ Journal, a publication of the National Institute of Justice.

KATHLEEN COLLINS (Library) had her new book, Watching What We Eat: The Evolution of Television Cooking Shows published this month by Continuum.

DIANA E. FRIEDLAND (Sciences) has published a manuscript in the February 2009 issue of Biochimica et Biophysica Acta: Genes and Regulatory Mechanisms. The title of the paper is “Characterization of pokeweed antiviral protein binding to mRNA cap analogs: Competition with nucleotides and enhancement by translation initiation factor iso4G.” Friedland presented this work with student researchers from John Jay and Pace University.

ANDREW KARMEN (Sociology) had the seventh edition of his book Crime Victims: An Introduction To Victimology, published recently by Wadsworth/Cengage. The original edition, published in 1984, was the first and only comprehensive textbook in the victimology field at that time.

PEER REVIEWROBERT MCCRIE (Protection Management) received the Eugene R. Fink Memorial Award from the Associated Licensed Detectives of the State of New York at the group’s annual banquet in New York.

ISABELLE CURRO (Security) received one of the New York State Bar Association’s President’s Pro Bono Service Awards on May 1, in recognition of her work in promoting pro bono service as a path to achieving equal access to justice.

JANE KATZ (Health and Physical Education) competed in the recent Albatross Open masters’ swim meet held in North Bethesda, MD, by the Montgomery Ancient Swimmers. She won the 50-meter, 100-meter and 200-meter backstroke events, setting a new meet record in the 100-meter race.

RODDRICK COLVIN (Public Management) was recently elected as the incoming President of the New York State Political Science Association.

For the fifth consecutive year, a delegation of John Jay students captured a top honor at the National Model U.N. (NMUN) Conference, held in New York April 7-11.

The 16-member John Jay contingent, which this year represented the African nation of Burkina Faso at the NMUN, won an honorable mention for overall team performance, as well as the team’s first-ever award for outstanding position paper.

“As you can imagine, we are all extremely pleased with this outcome,” said a proud Professor George Andreopoulos of the government department, who is director of the John Jay Center on International Human Rights and an advisor to the team. “Being part of this team is entirely voluntary and takes hours of hard work and determination to carefully and accurately manage being a delegate, while being a full-time student and, for some, a full-time employee as well.”

The team served as delegates on seven different U.N. committees and as an independent advisory justice and clerk on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). In

preparation for the conference, the students conducted extensive research on the national, regional and international policies of Burkina Faso on topics ranging from the situation in Israel/Palestine and the rights of children in armed conflict to climate-change economics and regional trade and integration, in addition to the applicable law for the two cases before the Rwanda tribunal.

The 2009 team, chosen from a pool of roughly 50 applicants after a rigorous screening process, included Patrick Scullin, Rennae Francis, Gabriele C. Ursitti, Mark Benjamin, Eva Helena Hernik, Stephanie Valarezo, Norhan Basuni, Mike Rodriguez, Beyi Polanco, Ama-Mariya Ampah, Geeta Gangadeen, Peter J. Cella, Marie-Andree Barthelemy, David Sabatelle, Jennifer Shim and Natalia Lysetska. Matt Zommer, a lecturer in the government department, assisted by his department colleagues Jacques Fomerand and Andreopoulos, coached them.

The NMUN Conference is recognized as one of the largest, international collegiate competitions in the world, attended by more than 3,000 students from 29 countries.

Members of the John Jay faculty were honored at an April 23 reception for their outstanding efforts in teaching, scholarship and service to students — “the three legs of the proverbial three-legged stool,” according to President Jeremy Travis.

New to the list of faculty honors this year was a Distinguished Teaching Prize, established by the office of Provost Jane Bowers and overseen by the advisory board of the Center for the Advancement of Teaching. Three faculty members were chosen for the initial prizes. Nathan Lents of the Department of Sciences was nominated by his colleague Anthony Carpi. Jillian Grose-Fifer of the Department of Philosophy and Dara Byrne of the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts, both of whom teach in the Freshman Learning Communities program, were nominated by students.

The award for Faculty Service to Students,

which recognizes mentoring, advisement and involvement in student activities, was presented to Carpi, one of the creators of the Program for Research Initiatives for Science Majors (PRISM). He was nominated by his department chair, Professor Lawrence Kobilinsky.

Awards for faculty scholarship included the Donal E. J. MacNamara Junior Faculty Award, which is presented annually to an instructor or assistant professor. The 2009 recipient was Amy Adamczyk of the Department of Sociology, a specialist in religious contextual influences on delinquency and cross-national differences in attitudes about crime and deviance.

Scholarly excellence awards were presented to Amy Adamczyk, Lisa Farrington (Art and Music), Bilal Khan (Mathematics and Computer Science), Margaret Bull Kovera (Psychology), Susan Opotow (Sociology), Hung-En Sung (Criminal Justice) and Philip Yanos (Psychology).

As the World Watches, John Jay Students Shine at U.N. Event

Kudos for Triple-Threat Faculty

CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE? Playwright and actor Sean Christopher Lewis stalks the

stage of the Gerald W. Lynch Theater during the New York premiere of his one-man play Killadelphia: Mixtape for a City on

April 29. The play, which weaves together the story of murdered teaching fellow Beau Zabel (on screen) with interviews of

inmates at Graterford Prison, was preceded by a panel discussion featuring the playwright along with Professors P.J. Gibson

and Peter Moskos, and Robyn Buseman of the Restorative Justice Program run by the Philadelphia Mural Arts Project.

COURT IS NOW IN SESSION: History’s most notorious betrayer, Judas Iscariot (kneel-

ing), is in the spotlight during a tense courtroom scene in The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, which was staged at John Jay April

21-25 under the direction of Professor Dana Tarantino. As an accompaniment to the play, the Department of Communication

and Theatre Arts presented a guest lecture “Judas on Trial: Theatre and Theology,” by the Rev. James Martin, S.J.


April 1, 2009

Worth NotingApril 1 3:15 PMIndoor Triathlon10 minutes each of swimming,cycling and running

Pool & Cardiovascular Fitness Center,Haaren Hall

April 6 2:00 PMJudas on Trial:Theatre and TheologyGuest lecture by the Rev. James Martin, SJ, advisor to the off-Broadway production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot.Presented by the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts


April 21 3:30 PMChangüí and thePan-Caribbean Rootsof Cuban Popular Musicin GuantánamoPresentation, Performance andBook Signing by Benjamin Lapidus


April 21-25 8:00 PMThe Last Days of Judas IscariotPresented by the Department ofCommunication and Theatre Arts

Gerald W. Lynch Theater(Call 212-695-6908 for ticket reservations.)

April 23 5:00 PMConversations inLiterature & LawConspiracy, Inc.: Zoot Suits,Cockroach People and Chicano Culture’s Rethinking of Legal DiscourseCarl Gutierrez-JonesUniversity of California, Santa Barbara


The Rev. Al Sharpton paid a call on John Jay on March 17, where he challenged students and others to help close the gap in treatment of people based on race.

“Institutional inequality in the United States hasn’t changed just because we’ve elected a black president,” said Sharpton, who ran for president himself in 2004.

At some point, you must have the courage to get in the game, to get involved,” he said, calling on students to “help formulate an agenda that will make this all work in your time, in your generation.”

Taking note of his surroundings — the nation’s premier college of criminal justice — Sharpton took issue with those who suggest that he and his civil rights organization, the National Action Network, are anti-police. “There’s a misnomer that we are anti-police because we are against police brutality,” Sharpton said. “We are no more anti-police than every cop who arrests a criminal in a minority neighborhood is anti-minority.”

President Jeremy Travis traveled to Washing-ton, DC, on March 12 to participate in a week-long series of hearings by a House Appropriations subcommittee on prisoner reentry and other criminal justice challenges.

“Our nation has never before witnessed the phenomenon of prisoner reentry at the scale we see today,” Travis told members of the Sub-committee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies. “There is a simple explanation: More people are coming home because we are putting more people in prison.”

The people coming home from prison — 90 percent of them male — face significant barriers to their reintegration, Travis said, and in many cases their return places huge burdens on urban localities already struggling with poor schools, poor health care and weak labor markets.

Travis said the historic Second Chance Act, passed with broad bipartisan support last year, has made an enormous difference in the nation’s

“If you have a hostility or disconnect between police and the community, it makes the police job that much more difficult,” noted Sharpton, who has been an invited speaker at recent police recruitment rallies.

Citing a number of cases of police brutality or excessive use of force, including the shooting of Sean Bell outside a Queens nightclub and the sodomizing of Abner Louima at a Brooklyn

The Rev. Al Sharpton greets Charly Feliz, a sophomore criminal justice major, outside the Gerald W. Lynch Theater following

his March 17 talk on the new civil rights movement.

approach to the reentry issue, but federal fund-ing for reentry initiatives remains woefully inad-equate. “The point is obvious,” said Travis. “If the federal government wishes to make a signifi-cant change in the experience of people leaving prison, much more money will be needed.”

Noting that recent and ongoing research has provided volumes of information on which inter-vention approaches work to promote prisoner reintegration, Travis told the subcommittee: “We should now marshal our resources to fund those interventions and to insist that all reentry pro-grams meet a standard of proven effectiveness.”

Travis urged Congress to provide support for several promising innovations, including offender notification forums, comprehensive interagency initiatives, reentry courts and community-based interventions. Such efforts, he said, “represent a new frontier in reentry innovation.”

[President Travis’s testimony can be read online at http://www.jjay.cuny.edu/2308.php.]

Travis Talks Reentrywith House Committee

Sharpton: “It’s Time to Get Involved”

It’s no secret that John Jay is a college filled with high-achieving students. LaKisha Hoffman, a 28-year-old undergraduate, is looking to add her name to the list, but in a rather unconventional way: She and her sister are contestants on the popular TV reality show “The Amazing Race.”

LaKisha, a youth program coordinator and basketball coach, recently transferred to John Jay from Western Illinois University. Both she and her 24-year-old sister, Jennifer, are former Division I college athletes, and they are hoping to become the first all-female team to win the around-the-world race.

“The same strengths that make me a good coach — patience and a strong competitive nature — will ultimately make me the best racer the game has seen,” LaKisha said.

The race was completed as this issue went to press, but the competitors are strictly prohibited from divulging any details as to the contest’s outcome. In one recent episode, the Hoffman sisters and other racers found themselves in Novosibirsk, Russia — 400 miles inside the Siberian heartland. There, they faced a series of challenges that included driving a balky, four-

speed Lada sedan over snowy streets to take a Russian bride to her wedding.

In another challenge, Jennifer was required to pair up with two local runners for a 1.4-mile jog to the local ballet and opera theater. There was just one hitch: she had to complete the run Siberian-style — in her underwear. Fortunately the weather was a balmy 27 degrees Fahrenheit, and Jennifer stripped down without hesitating, asking those around her, “Don’t I look hot?”

Prior to “The Amazing Race,” neither LaKisha nor her sister had traveled extensively outside of the United States. To them, the race is a “journey of a lifetime.”

John Jay Student and Sister Tackle “The Amazing Race”

Jennifer Hoffman jogs through a Siberian city in her underwear, accompanied by

her sister LaKisha (left) and a more sensibly clad Russian runner during an episode

of “The Amazing Race.”

Steamboat Is In, and Wallace Is AboardStudent Council President Wins Prestigious Summer Scholarship

Congratulations are in order to Shaheen Wal-lace, president of the John Jay Student Council, for winning the prestigious Steamboat Founda-tion Summer Scholarship. He topped a field of more than 300 eligible students to become the third John Jay student to win the coveted honor.

Like the two winners who preceded him — Abdoulaye Diallo in 2007, and Amanda Ingle in 2008 — Wallace, a junior government major, will be partnered with the Center for Court Innova-tion (CCI) for the three-month paid internship.

The scholarship provided by the Greenwich, CT-based Steamboat Foundation allows out-standing students to connect with acknowledged leaders in public, private and nonprofit organiza-tions. John Jay’s Office of Honors, Awards and Special Opportunities identified 315 eligible students — those expected to graduate in 2010 and carrying a current GPA of at least 3.5 — and invited them to apply. Litna McNickle, the office’s

director, said the process of paring down the field was “very rigorous.”

The office held workshops on résumé writing, crafting personal statements, how to dress for success, and more. The goal was to find candi-dates who were self-motivated and possessed first-rate writing skills, among other traits, ac-cording to McNickle.

“It’s a good way to insure that we have vetted very strong, capable students who are going to perform well as Steamboat Scholars,” she said.

Wallace underwent a series of nine interviews, including sessions with John Jay President Jeremy Travis and Adam Mansky, the director of CCI. “I’ve never done anything that draining in my life,” he said. “It’s not for the faint-hearted, and it’s definitely a test of character. But after I was done, it was really a great feeling.”

Wallace has his sights set on attending law school and becoming a federal prosecutor. Shaheen Wallace

stationhouse, Sharpton said the basis of protests he has led is that “you cannot let this kind of behavior go unchecked.”

The civil rights leader called for the creation of a special section within the U.S. Department of Justice to deal specifically with police misconduct. “It is only when you break out of local and county politics that you can get a measure of justice,” he observed.


@ John Jay is published by theDepartment of Institutional Advancement







PEER REVIEWJOHN MATTESON (English) is one of the judges of the 2009 Dashiell Hammett Prize, awarded annually for literary excellence in crime writing. Matteson also accepted an invitation to give the Class Day address at the Columbia University School of General Studies in May.

PRESENTING…BETSY HEGEMAN (Anthropology) presented “Culture-Bound Syndromes and Diagnosis” to the Grand Rounds of Upstate Medical School Departments of Psychiatry and Psychology in Syracuse, NY, on March 26. She also met with the Psychoanalytic Study Group of Syracuse and presented “MPD and Spirit Possession: the Influence of Culture”.

KIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) presented a paper on “Methamphetamine Abuse and Treatment in Rural America” at the 2009 annual meeting of the Southern Rural Sociological Association in Atlanta, GA, on January 31-February 3.

KWANDO M. KINSHASA (African American Studies) was invited to Saginaw Valley State University in Michigan from February 16-19 as their 2009 King-Chavez-Parks Visiting Scholar. As the visiting scholar, Kinshasa gave lectures on African American history, criminal justice, global migration policies, sociology and social policy. He also presented a paper titled “History and

One’s Sociological Memory: A Contemporary Interactive Perspective,” in which he revisited and discussed the sociological and economic implications of the 1955-1956 Montgomery, AL, Bus Boycott.

MICHAEL PFEIFER (History) served as commentator on a panel titled “Race, the Courts, and Public Spectacle in Louisiana” at the annual meeting of the Louisiana Historical Association in Monroe, LA, on March 19.

KLAUS VON LAMPE (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) was an invited speaker at the 12th European Police Congress in Berlin on February 11. He spoke on “The European Dimensions of Organized Crime: Some Remarks from a Criminological Perspective.”

M. VICTORIA PÉREZ-RÍOS (Government) presented a paper on the “UDHR and the Millennium Developmental Goals: Making the Three Generations of Rights a Reality” and was the discussant on a panel on Transitional Justice at the International Studies Association annual convention in New York from February 15-18.

JON-CHRISTIAN SUGGS (English, emeritus) gave the keynote lecture, “Imperium in Imperio: Double Consciousness, Double Citizenship and the Promise of the Obama Presidency,” for African-American History Month at Salisbury University in Salisbury, MD, on February 10. In

April he will present a paper on race and “love” in Melville’s Billy Budd at the American Society for Law, Culture, and the Humanities in Boston; in May he will present two chapters of his novel-in-progress, After Jubilee, at the Working Group on Law and Slavery at the Gilder-Lehrman Center at Yale, and in June he will present a paper on Hannah Elias and the murder of “the man who invented New York” at the annual conference on New York State history.

GLORIA PRONI and ELISE CHAMPEIL (Sciences) presented a paper titled “Assessment of Students’ Likeability of the ‘Clicker’ and ‘Wiley Plus’ Technologies in Organic Chemistry” at the CUNY IT Conference on December 5, 2008.

BETWEEN THE COVERSGLORIA PRONI (Sciences) will have her articles “CD-sensitive Zn-porphyrin tweezer host-guest complexes. Part 1: MC/OPLS-2005 computational approach for predicting preferred interporphyrin helicity” and “CD-sensitive Zn-porphyrin tweezer host-guest complexes. Part 2: cis- and trans-3-hydroxy-4-aryl/alkyl-beta-lactams. A case study” published in a forthcoming issue of the peer-reviewed scientific journal Chirality.

SIMON BAATZ (History) is the author of the foreword to a new edition of Clarence Darrow’s Crime: Its Cause and Treatment, published in the Kaplan Classics of Law series.

Institutional MemoryIn addition to Professors Odabashian and Sapse, the

following people were recognized for long service to the

John Jay community:

35 Years: Roselyn Blassberger, Edward Davenport, Jannette

O. Domingo, Francis McHugh, Arnold Osansky, Meyer J.

Peikes, Patricia Sinatra;

30 Years: Warren F. Benton, William C. Heffernan, Alan

Hoenig, Marlene Kandel, Debra Hairston-Parker, Francis

X. Sheehan, Rodolfo G. Sy, Maria R. Volpe, Linda R. Von

Lumm;

25 Years: José Arcaya, Robert C. Delucia, Mary S. Gibson,

Ernest Gilde, Lesley A. Hansen, Inez Ligon, Sylvia Lopez,

Mayra Nieves, Esther Owens, Alan Winson, Shirley D.

Zimmerman;

20 Years: Frederick R. Brodzinski, Kinya Y. Chandler,

Catherine F. Collins, Saundra Dancy, Yvonne A. Hatchett,

Dennis P. Hood, Ainsworth James, Jane Katz, Jonathan

E. Kranz, Michael A. Liddie, Phillip N. Marsh, Thomas

McGonigle, Eugene O’Donnell, Frank J. Pannizzo, Jill C.

Robbins, Lisa Rodriguez, Denise B. Santiago, Ronald R.

Spadafora, Frank G. Straub, Wendell J. Velez, Beatrice

Young.

Two new faculty members and 24 new staff were given their official welcome to John Jay on March 9 at the Spring 2009 Faculty and Staff Meeting, an event that also served as the occasion for recognizing those who have served the College for 20 or more years, as well as faculty who are newly tenured or promoted.

Joining the faculty were Charles McKenzie, an assistant professor of English who will be focusing his scholarship on John Jay’s new literature and law major, and Jon M. Shane, an assistant professor of police science and a specialist in organizational stressors and police performance.

The newest staff members include nine from Academic Affairs, six from Enrollment Management, three from Finance and Administration, three from Institutional Advancement, two from Student Development and one from the Office of the President.

Fifty members of the John Jay community were recognized for long service to the College. The 2009 honorees were led by two faculty members with 40 years of service: Barbara

Odabashian (English) and Anne-Marie Sapse (Sciences). In addition, the faculty and staff meeting honored newly tenured and promoted faculty, a 29-member contingent led by four new full professors: Luis Barrios (Latin American and Latina/o Studies), Anthony Carpi (Sciences), Bilal Khan (Mathematics and Computer Science) and Karen Terry (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration).

A John Jay Welcome, andThanks for a Job Well Done

Jeremy Pohl, a 2008 graduate of John Jay’s forensic science

program who now works at the New York City police crime

lab, has won the Eastern Analytical Symposium Student

Award for his outstanding research in forensic analytical

chemistry. Pohl has been working with Professor Yi He

of the Department of Sciences (at right in photo) on a

project to develop a novel method for detecting trace

levels of methamphetamine and its metabolite in urine

samples. A patent application has been submitted for the

procedure, which is said to have potential commercial

value. In addition, a manuscript has been submitted to

a peer reviewed journal. The award was presented by

Professor Barbara Kebbekus of the New Jersey Institute of

Technology (left in photo).

The McCabe Fellowship Breakfast held on March 13 turned into a homecoming of sorts, with a former honoree and a former McCabe Fellow among those who traveled from Ireland to attend the annual celebration at John Jay.

The event celebrates the exchange program created in memory of Irish police detective Jerry McCabe, who was killed in the line of duty dur-ing an attempted robbery in June 1996. Each year, two or more members of An Garda Siochá-na, the Irish national police, come to John Jay for an intensive course of study toward a graduate degree.

Former keynote speaker and honoree Niall Burgess, the Irish consul general in New York, at-tended the McCabe breakfast and offered greet-ings in which he observed that the connection between John Jay and the Republic of Ireland is part of the “mighty strength that links our two countries.”

And, in a nod to those at the event who ac-knowledged wearing green only one day a year — on St. Patrick’s Day — Burgess said, “We’re all Irish in God’s eyes.”

Also bringing greetings to McCabe attendees was Detective Superintendent Orla McPartlin of

SIMPLY OUTSTANDING

An Garda, who earned a master’s degree from John Jay as one of the first McCabe scholars, from 1997-1998. She now heads the police service’s international liaison section.

Professor Bettina Murray, a member of the John Jay Foundation board, introduced the morning’s keynote speaker and honoree, Seán Aylward, Secretary General of the Irish Ministry of Justice, as the “steady hand on the tiller that keeps the Ministry of Justice on course.” Aylward noted the violent deaths of two British soldiers and an Irish police constable in the week prior to the McCabe breakfast, and said the murdered peacekeepers had “left behind a community that doesn’t want to return to the days of violence.”

Citing the words of John Jay, Aylward ob-served, “Wise rulers will recognize that the best way to frustrate the efforts of those who would tear us apart through violence is by unity of pur-pose.” He called on police to exercise moral and legal leadership while employing a minimum use of force.

This year’s McCabe scholars are Gardaí John Griffin, a graduate student in public administra-tion, and Emer Clarke, who is pursing a master’s in criminal justice.

McCabe Fellowship Breakfast Means Wearing o’ the Green

OUTRAGEIN DARFURXabier Agirre, senior analyst with

the Office of the Prosecutor of the

International Criminal Court in The

Hague, was the featured speaker

for the International Criminal

Justice Major lecture series on

February 26, where he spoke about

the use of crime mapping and other

data analysis techniques to indict

Sudanese officials for genocide

and other crimes against humanity

in the Darfur region. Agirre is the

author of the forthcoming book

Methodology for the Investigation

of International Crimes (Brill, 2010).

Professor Anne-Marie Sapse and President Travis enjoy a

laugh as she reflected on her 40 years at John Jay.

Criminal InjusticeMarty Tankleff (above left) greets award-winning author and investigative reporter Richard Firstman following the March 17 Book & Author Series presentation on A Criminal Injustice: A True Crime, a False Confession, and the Fight to Free Marty Tankleff, co-authored by Firstman and former NYPD detective Jay Salpeter (right). The book tells the story of Tankleff’s wrongful conviction and 17-year imprisonment for the murders of his parents. He was freed in 2007, largely on the strength of new evidence unearthed by Salpeter.

Distinguished Professor Saul Kassin (rear), an expert in false confessions, moderated the event, telling the audience, “This is a crazy case about how powerful a confession can be when it’s accompanied by no other evidence.” Salpeter, a John Jay alumnus (BA, 1978) who spent seven years working to get Tankleff exonerated and freed, said Tankleff, then just 17 years old, was arrested by the lead detective in the case to protect the actual killer. “Not one thing in this case was properly investigated,” he said. Firstman said everything in Tankleff’s “so-called confession” ended up being disproven.


March 11, 2009

Worth NotingMarch 13 8:30 AMMcCabe Fellowship BreakfastGuest speaker: Seán Aylward,Secretary General,Department of Justice,Republic of IrelandRSVP to [email protected]

4th Floor, Haaren Hall

March 17 4:00 PMBook & Author LectureA Criminal Injustice: A True Crime,a False Confession, and the Fight toFree Marty TankleffRichard Firstman and Jay SalpeterModerated by Professor Saul Kassin


March 19 5:00 PMConversations inLiterature & LawWhere the Wild Things Are: Children’s Literature and the Constitution of LawDesmond MandersonMcGill University


March 22 4:00 PMWater, Our Most Precious Resource: A Celebrationof World Water DayA narrated concert including traditional spirituals, gospel and folk music


March 30 6:00 PM2009 Alumni ReunionSaluting the classes of 1969, 1974,1979, 1984, 1989, 1994, 1999 and 2004.Honorees: Anthony J. Lamberti, Esq.(BA, 1978) and Professor Karen Kaplowitz, English DepartmentRSVP to [email protected]

Gymnasium, Haaren Hall

Vivien Hoexter, a veteran executive in the highly competitive nonprofit sector, has been named as the College’s new Vice President for Marketing and Development.

President Jeremy Travis announced the appointment on February 9. Hoexter succeeds Tova Friedler, who retired at the end of January.

“In every position she has held, Vivien has been highly successful at increasing the organization’s visibility, build-ing a team of professionals committed to the organiza-tion’s mission, and leveraging external support for that mission,” Travis said. “These skills are precisely what John Jay needs at this point in our history.”

Hoexter most recently served as chief executive officer of Gilda’s Club Worldwide, an organization that provides emotional and social support to people with cancer, their families and friends. In that role she doubled the organization’s fundraising income, launched a planned-giving campaign and generated more than $1 million through a new corporate

Vice President for Marketing and Development

Vivien Hoexter

fundraising program.Prior to Gilda’s Club,

Hoexter was vice president of AFS Intercultural Programs/USA, one of the world’s largest international high school exchange programs. She has also been director of development for The Hunger Project, a global anti-poverty initiative.

Hoexter earned her bachelor’s degree in history (magna cum laude) from Yale College, and a master’s degree in business administration, with a concentration in marketing, from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

“I am thrilled to be part of such a vibrant community,” said Hoexter, whose department includes alumni relations, fundraising and development, special events planning, communications, public relations, graphics and design, and Web site management. “I look forward to serving the students, faculty and other stakeholders of this very important institution.”

Sixty of John Jay’s faculty members, staff and students arrived in Boston on March 10 for the four-day annual meeting of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences (ACJS), to present the fruits of their current research efforts.

“Once again John Jay will have more presenters at the ACJS conference than any other college or university in the country,” said Dean for Research James Levine, who is among the conference attendees. “This is yet another manifestation of our ever-expanding research agendas and our prominence in the world of criminal justice scholarship.”

At the conference, Professor Staci Strobl was named as the winner of the Richard J. Terrill Paper of the Year Award. Strobl was honored for “The Women’s Police Directorate in Bahrain: An Ethnographic Exploration of Gender Segregation and the Likelihood of Future Integration.” This article appeared in the International Criminal Justice Review and was hailed by the journal’s editor as “an excellent piece of scholarship.”

Underscoring the prevalence of faculty-student

One sure sign that spring is just around the corner is the return of baseball and softball to the John Jay calendar.

The men’s baseball team opened its eighth season under head coach Dan Palumbo on February 22, in a road game played under raw wintry conditions against Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, NJ. The Bloodhounds lost 12-7 in their only game before heading South for a seven-game trip to Florida.

The women’s softball team began its 2009 season on March 6 with a four-game tournament in Virginia Beach, VA. Results of those games were not available as this issue went to press.

“We had a positive season last year which was perfect to build on when approaching this season,” said second-year head coach Laura Drazdowski. “We are a much different team

from a year ago. We have our core group of players returning this year along with a great incoming class, which is the perfect recipe for improvement. The veterans are excited about what they believe we can accomplish this season, and the newcomers are enthusiastic and eager to prove themselves.”

The team is led by junior shortstop Danielle Bonici, a first-team CUNY Athletic Conference all-star, and senior catcher Marlenne Nuñez, a second-team all-star. They are among 10 returning players from the 2008 team, including sophomore starting pitchers Angela Lam and Nina Chao. Seven freshmen have been added to the squad.

The softball team begins its home season on March 28 with a doubleheader against conference rival Baruch.

The 2008 baseball team narrowly lost out in a bid for a second straight CUNYAC title, falling to the College of Staten Island 8-7 in the championship game. This year’s squad will feature five returning position players, including first-team conference all-stars John Massoni in right field and Xavier Perez at shortstop.

When not playing the outfield, Massoni will

research collaborations at John Jay, at least 20 students from a variety of undergraduate, graduate and doctoral programs attended the conference as presenters or panel discussants.

John Jay faculty representatives at the ACJS conference included: Alissa Ackerman, Katarzyna Celinska, Serguei Cheloukhine, Todd Clear, John DeCarlo, Kristin Englander, Beverly Frazier, Lior Gideon, Maki Haberfeld, Joseph King, Charles Lieberman, James Lynch, Yue Ma, Kevin McCarthy, Frank Pezzella, Megan Sacks, Walter Signorelli, Eli Silverman, Staci Strobl, Hung-En Sung, Karen Terry, Carrie Trojan and Cecile van de Voorde (Law and Police Science); Elizabeth Jeglic, Cynthia Calkins Mercado and Gabrielle Salfati (Psychology); Rosemary Barberet and Brenda Vollman (Sociology); David Kennedy (Anthropology/Center on Crime Prevention and Control); Matthew Zommer (Government); Marvie Brooks and Larry E. Sullivan (Library); Richard Culp and Vincenzo Sainato (Public Management); Roberta Belli and Candace McCoy (criminal justice doctoral program).

Marketing & DevelopmentPro Is John Jay’s Newest VP

John Jay Delegation TakesACJS Conference by Storm

Black History Month Wraps Up with Salute to Malcolm X, Dr. King, Obama & Malone

help anchor a pitching staff that also includes fellow senior Michael Colletta.

Catcher Luis Guzman, a second-team CUNYAC all-star, will return to his duties behind home plate, while centerfielder Edwin Hernandez and first baseman Johan Abad are also back for another season. All three are juniors.

“This team is working incredibly hard right now,” Palumbo said in a pre-season assessment. “We have a better work ethic than I have seen in a few years and there is a great feeling of cohesiveness on the team.”

Play Ball!Baseball & Softball Teams See Big Things in Store in 2009

Luis Guzman (left) and Michael Colletta hope to be part of

another championship season for John Jay’s baseball team.

Milly-ann Isaac belts out the anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing” at the 19th annual Mal-colm/King Breakfast on February 27, as President Jeremy Travis, Vice President for Student Develop-ment Berenecea Johnson Eanes, Dean of Gradu-ate Studies Jannette Domingo and Dr. James Malone look on.

Malone, the event’s honoree, retired in January after 40 years at John Jay, during which he served as the first director of the SEEK Department, the first vice president for administrative affairs and dean of students, among other positions. Travis pointed out that Malone also served as a tennis opponent and coach. In his acceptance remarks, Malone said: “What I am most proud of are the many students I have helped to develop a differ-ent world view. That makes my heart sing.”

The event’s scheduled keynote speaker, New York State Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith, was unable to attend due to unforeseen circumstances.









PRESENTINGMIRIAM EHRENBERG (Psychology) gave an invited address at the annual conference of Globalisation for the Common Good, held in Melbourne, Australia. Her paper, “Applying Psychotherapy Techniques to Religious and Ethnic Conflict,” covered both western and Islamic psychotherapy approaches and the implications of each for conflict resolution.

JEREMY TRAVIS (President) was the keynote speaker at the Public Service Conference on the Future of Community Justice in Wisconsin at Marquette Law School on February 20. His remarks focused on “Building Communities with

Justice: Overcoming the Tyranny of the Funnel.”

GEORGE ANDREOPOULOS (Government) delivered a series of lectures on “The Evolution of International Human Rights Norms” at the University of Bologna in January. The lectures were part of the university’s graduate program in human rights and humanitarian intervention.

PETER MOSKOS (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) was a panelist at the New York Academy of Medicine’s “Harm Reduction” conference on January 23. He was also a featured speaker at the annual conference of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, held in College Park, MD, on November 23.

R. TERRY FURST (Anthropology) presented “A Qualitative Exploration of Suboxone Opioid Maintenance in a Harm Reduction Setting in New York City,” a paper cowritten with Herman Joseph, and Sharon Stancliff, at the Columbia University Seminar Series in New York in Decem-ber. Furst was also one of the authors, along with Stancliff and Joseph, of “Low Threshold Buprenorphine,” a paper presented by Stancliff

at the 7th National Harm Reduction Conference in Miami last November.

BETWEEN THE COVERSPATRICK COLLINS (Communication & Theatre Arts) had two books released in January by Sterling Publishers, a Barnes and Noble imprint. Negotiate to Win! is a tactical guide to achieving success in negotiations, and features a unique chapter on cross-cultural negotiation. The second book, Speak with Power and Confidence, is an updated and revised edition of Collins’ comprehensive guide to maximizing public speaking skills, originally published in 1998. Both works attracted the attention of foreign publishers at the Fall 2008 Frankfurt Book Fair.

JOSEPH KING (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) published his article “Policing after Peel: the Government Moves to Centralize” in the Turkish Journal of Police Stud-ies in 2008. His article “Police Problems: Labor Relations in the Early Police Service of the United Kingdom” appeared in the January 2009 issue of Police Forum, published by the Police Section of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.

As the saying goes, it’s not what you say, but how you say it. According to forensic linguistics experts, however, it may be both.

An all-day workshop on February 20, co-sponsored by the Center for Modern Forensic Practice and the Department of English, brought together two of the top experts in the field to discuss “Forensic Linguistics for Investigative Practitioners,” with a focus on threat assessment, counterterrorism and criminal communications.

The workshop was conducted in a split-session format by Robert Leonard, head of the Hofstra University Department of Linguistics and director of the Hofstra Forensic Linguistic Project, and James R. Fitzgerald, a former FBI supervisory special agent who is now a violent crime consultant and a forensic linguist with the Academy Group Inc.

Fitzgerald, a member of the FBI’s Unabom task force, described the investigation that ultimately led to the arrest and conviction of Theodore Kaczynski in 1996 as the “largest authorial attribution project ever undertaken by the FBI.” The task force, which at its peak considered roughly 2,500 suspects in the serial bombing investigation, pored over the 35,000-word

The legacy of Lloyd Sealy — pioneering police commander and educator — lived on at the annual lecture event named for the late John Jay professor, in a lively discussion of how police leaders can use research to reduce racial bias.

The event, co-sponsored by John Jay and the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE), featured Dr. Tracie Keesee, the Division Chief of Research, Training and Technology for the Denver Police Department, and Dr. Phillip Atiba Goff, a social psychologist at the University of California, Los Angeles. The two have been exploring how research and training can be applied together to address possible racial bias in police decision-making.

“As police officers, especially black officers, we struggle to do the right thing, and to do right by the community,” said Keesee, a 20-year police veteran. To that end, the Denver PD conducted extensive research to determine the extent to which racial bias and stereotyped beliefs may influence officers’ handling of certain situations, such as the decision to stop, arrest or use physical force.

“We brought in world-class scientists to ask pointed questions,” said Keesee. “After all, we in law enforcement often think we know all the answers.” The department created a partnership arrangement with university-based researchers,

giving them wide access to information and promising them autonomy in terms of publishing their findings.

Using a high-tech virtual reality simulator, officers were measured for their reactions to and handling of various threatening situations. In general, racial bias was found to affect officers’ reaction time, but not the decision to shoot the suspect. The department created a feedback loop consisting of officers’ behavior, training evaluations and psychological testing, Keesee said, and researchers were able to conclude that “training does what it’s supposed to do.”

Goff followed Keesee to the podium and noted that as an outgrowth of the Denver research, a Consortium for Police Leadership in Equity was established, consisting of 15 police departments nationwide and researchers from John Jay, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and UCLA. “The challenge for researchers is how do we translate findings from the lab to the street,” he said.

“Like Lloyd Sealy, we believe education is a powerful weapon for civil rights,” Goff added.

Sealy was one of 60 founding members of NOBLE in 1976. His 34-year career with the New York City Police Department saw him become the department’s first black precinct commander, and retire at the rank of assistant chief inspector.

ALISSE WATERSTON (Anthropology) has had two new edited volumes published: An Anthropology of War: Views from the Frontline (Berghahn Books, 2009) and Anthropology Off the Shelf: Anthropologists on Writing (Wiley Blackwell, 2009, Maria D. Vesperi, co-editor). An Anthropology of War includes Waterston’s introduction, “On War and Accountability.” Anthropology off the Shelf includes a chapter by Waterston titled “Writing Poverty, Draw-ing Readers: Stories in Love, Sorrow and Rage.” Waterston serves as chair of the American Anthropological Association’s Committee on the Future of Print and Electronic Publishing to guide the digital transition of scholarly publish-ing. In November, Waterston presented a talk at the association’s annual meeting on “The Acad-emy, the Market-State and the Dissemination of Anthropological Knowledge in the Digital Age.”

PETER MOSKOS (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) had his book review of Hugh Holton’s The Thin Black Line: True Stories by Black Law Enforcement Officers Policing America’s Meanest Streets published in The Washington Post on January 11.

manifesto written by Kaczynski in search of clues. One of the phenomena spotted in the document, as in numerous similar communications, was what Fitzgerald called “contraindicators,” or words and phrases that actually mean the opposite of what they appear to suggest.

“What kind of person wrote this?” Fitzgerald said, noting that 95 percent of threat letters handled by the FBI are anonymous, and the writers usually put as much effort into the threat as they do into maintaining their anonymity.

Other tip offs spotted by investigators include whether an individual writes out dates numerically with hyphens — as in 9-11-01 — slashes — 9/11/01 — or periods — 9.11.01. The postmarks and return addresses on threat letters may also be contraindicators, Fitzgerald said, in an attempt to confuse investigators. Such was the case with the 2001 Americathrax case, in which anthrax poison was mailed to a number of different targets.

Fitzgerald and Leonard first met during the course of the Americathrax investigation that led nearly seven years later to the FBI’s identification of chemist Bruce T. Ivins as the most likely suspect.

Like Sealy, Researchers atAnnual Lecture See Education as a Weapon for Civil Rights

Reducing Racial Bias by Police Is the Goal

Speech Sleuths Analyze Art & Science of Forensic Linguistics

Tracie Keesee, a division chief with the Denver Police Department, explores the use of research to reduce police bias, while

co-researcher Phillp Atiba Goff awaits his turn at the microphone during the annual Lloyd Sealy Lecture. (See story at left.)

On the Margins

Alford Young Jr., a sociologist at the University of Michigan and author of The Minds of Mar-

ginalized Black Men: Making Sense of Mobility. Opportunity and Future Life Chances, interacts

with the audience that packed the Gerald W. Lynch Theater Lobby during a February 23 discus-

sion and book-signing event co-sponsored by Center on Race, Crime and Justice.

Darkest NightPerformers from the Ruth Kanner Theatre Group at Tel Aviv

University stage a scene from Cases of Murder (November

9, 1938: A protocol of fear brutality and death) during

a special presentation at John Jay on February 27. The

theatrical work reconstructs acts of violence committed

against Jews during the night between November 9 and

10, 1938, known as Krystallnacht. Using a montage of

documentary and literary devices, the scenes from Cases of

Murder exposed the mechanisms of moral evasion, vague

and ambiguous talk and turning blind eyes that made

the atrocities possible. “It was significant that this work

occurred at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. The larger

discourse on genocide, war crimes, human rights abuses

and the struggle for social justice is clearly served by events

such as this,” said Professor Seth Baumrin, who facilitated

the event for the Department of Communication and The-

atre Arts. The presentation also included readings of new

work on the investigation of war crimes, enacted by John

Jay Professor Ric Curtis and student Luis Guitierrez, and a

discussion led by Professor Itai Sneh.


February 18, 2009

Worth NotingFebruary 23 12:30 PM - 3:00 PMMaking (Much) Better Senseof the Culture of Black Menin CrisisDr. Alford Young Jr.University of MichiganCo-sponsored by the Department of Sociology, Department of African- American Studies, Gender Studies Program, the John Jay Black Male Initiative and the Center on Race, Crime and Justice.


February 24 6:00 PMLloyd Sealy LectureLeadership in Police Equity:Using Research to Reduce Racial BiasDr. Tracie L. KeeseeDenver Police DepartmentDr. Phillip Atiba GoffUniversity of California-Los Angeles


February 27 8:30 AMPrisoner Reentry Institute Occasional Series onReentry ResearchIncarceration and Sexually Transmitted Infections: A Neighborhood PerspectiveJames ThomasUniversity of North Carolina-Chapel Hill


February 27 9:00 AM19th AnnualMalcolm/King BreakfastKeynote speaker:The Hon. Malcolm A. SmithMajority Leader, New York State SenateHonoree:Dr. James MaloneProfessor of CounselingRSVP to 212-237-8764


February 28 9:00 AM - 4:00 PMLaw Day @ John JayIncluding the Samuel and Anna Jacobs Foundation Lecture on the Law and the Legal Profession Speaker: The Hon. Juanita Bing NewtonDeputy Chief Administrative Judgefor Justice InitiativesCriminal Court of the City of New York

RSVP to www.jjay.cuny.edu/lawday

Various locations, Haaren Hall

A two-day conference intended, in the words of its organizer, to produce more light than heat, the Fourth Annual Harry Frank Guggenheim Symposium on Crime in America returned to John Jay on February 2-3, with journalists, academicians and practitioners from across the United States taking a nuanced look at recent and impending changes in criminal justice.

“This symposium has become a meeting place for people in criminal justice, a field that’s changing even as we speak,” said Stephen Handelman, Director of the Center on Media, Crime and Justice, which organized the event, with funding from the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation.

Focusing on the theme “A New Beginning? Exploring the Criminal Justice Challenges Over the Next Four Years,” the symposium wasted no time before diving into one of the thorniest issues currently on the American agenda, as panelists discussed the nation’s distressed economy and its relationship to crime trends.

Crime trends, like economic conditions, are characterized by volatility, observed Professor Richard Rosenfeld of the University of Missouri-St. Louis. While Rosenfeld’s research showed similar patterns between crime trends and consumer confidence, he said that an increase in crime is not inevitable despite the recent sharp reversals in the economy. “After all,” he said, “crime did not increase substantially during the Great Depression.”

Professor Delores Jones-Brown, Director of the Center on Race, Crime and Justice said the Obama Administration must deal with the “lack of legitimacy for police in communities of color.” With the economic downturn, she added, people may seek out jobs in law enforcement solely for the pay and benefits, rather than for public-service reasons, thereby increasing the potential for incidents of excessive or lethal use of force by

police, particularly against young black males.Col. Dean Esserman, the Police Chief of

Providence, RI, called on the assembled journal-ists to “tell the story” that America is losing its children to violence. “We bury our children or we arrest them. Where’s the moral outrage?” Esser-man said. “The story is not being told.”

Keynote speaker Judith S. Kaye, who recently retired after 15 years as Chief Judge of the New York State Court of Appeals, was introduced by President Jeremy Travis as “one of my heroes in this world.” Kaye, who was making her first public appearance since stepping down from the bench, urged attendees to focus on the “crucial but thoroughly unfulfilled job of educating the public about criminal justice matters.”

Among the issues that Kaye pointed to were the cost of incarceration compared to the cost

of education; the prosecution of certain juvenile offenders as adults; and the need to provide alternatives to criminal justice, such as youth courts or restorative justice. “This is the time for all of us who care about justice in this country to roll up our sleeves and get to work,” Kaye said.

Steven Brill, founder of American Lawyer magazine, Court TV and Verified Identity Pass Inc., served as keynote speaker for the sympo-sium’s awards luncheon, and reminded the audi-ence of his rule for covering the justice system: “Skepticism is an absolutely essential virtue.”

“The real challenge for us as reporters is not to be anyone’s lapdogs,” said Brill.

The symposium also included sessions on “solutions-oriented” crime coverage, privacy and civil liberties, the future of forensics, and the online world and crime.

Deadlines are looming for qualified John Jay students to apply for hundreds of thousands of dollars in scholarship funds, and dozens of awards for graduating seniors.

“We have no shortage of highly qualified students at the College, and we’re always looking for more,” said Vice President for Enrollment Management Richard Saulnier. “We’re trying to ensure that institutional scholarship funds are being spent for the purposes they were intended, which is why we are encouraging as many qualified students as possible to apply.”

The College offers scholarships for freshmen, sophomores, upper-division and graduate students as well as some specifically aimed at women, international students, law enforcement

A newspaper need not be big to achieve big things, as was proven by Christine Young, a reporter for the 80,000-circulation Times Herald-Record of Middletown, NY, one of the 2009 win-ners of John Jay College’s Excellence in Criminal Justice Reporting Awards.

Young was honored at a luncheon on Febru-ary 3 for her investigative report on the 1989 conviction of Lebrew Jones, who has spent 20 years in prison for the murder of a Manhattan prostitute. Young’s article, “I Didn’t Do That Mur-der,” prompted the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office to open a new investigation into the case.

The awards are presented annually in conjunction with the Harry Frank Guggenheim Symposium on Crime in America.

A second award was presented to Eric Nalder and the investigative team from the Seattle

employees, research-minded students and more. Many scholarships at both the undergraduate and graduate levels have March 2 deadlines, and still others have March 23 closing dates.

Scholarship Coordinator Michael Scaduto pointed out that most scholarships require completion and submission of the John Jay Scholarship General Application form, available online at http://www.jjay.cuny.edu/GeneralScholarshipApplication08.

pdf. Many also require essays and/or letters of recommendation.

For a list of scholarships that are currently available, including descriptions and eligibility criteria, go to http://www.jjay.cuny.edu/scholarships.php. Information is also available in the Office of Scholarship Services, Room 1285N.

“We’re taking a more strategic direction with regard to scholarships,” said Scaduto. “We want to recruit and retain qualified students, based on

things like academics, public service and activities outside of academics, and then support them once they’re on campus, keeping them active in the larger John Jay community.”

Scaduto noted that a “representative” 11-member scholarship committee, chaired by Saulnier, has been working proactively to inform students about available scholarships and encouraging them to apply. “We develop criteria, select candidates and set application deadlines,” he said.

A new Web feature allows students to sign up for the “John Jay College Scholars Network” to receive information about new and current scholarships, application information and deadlines, invitations to workshops and seminars, and other relevant updates.

Deadlines Loom for Scholarship Aid to Qualified Students

The Office of Scholarship Services is taking a strategic ap-

proach to finding qualified candidates for scholarship aid.

Distinguished Professor Todd Clear makes a point during a panel discussion on “The Sentencing and Corrections Challenge”

during the Guggenheim symposium. Also on the panel were (from left) Beryl Howell, a member of the U.S. Sentencing Com-

mission, and U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner of Massachusetts.

Gazing into the Crystal BallSymposium Looks at Criminal Justice Challenges on the Horizon

Post-Intelligencer, for their series “The Strong Arm of the Law,” which exposed Seattle police bias in arrests for obstruction of justice and the questionable handling of complaints against police for wrongful use of force.

“This year’s winning news stories show that newspapers large and small take seriously their commitment to reporting on criminal justice issues,” said President Jeremy Travis.

Honorable-mention citations were awarded to Steve Weinberg of Miller-McCune magazine, for his exploration of wrongful convictions around the United States; Lomi Kriel and John Tedesco of the San Antonio Express-News, for their critical examination of the San Antonio police Tactical Response Unit, and Geoff Dutton and Mike Wagner of the Columbus Dispatch, for their series on Ohio’s DNA inmate testing program.

Award winners Christine Young and Eric Nalder are joined

by keynote speaker Steven Brill, founder of Court TV.

College Salutes Reporters’ Quest for Justice









ON BOARDBEN JORGENSEN (Physical Education and Athletics) was named as the College’s new head men’s tennis coach. Jorgensen, who has been a tennis instructor for more than 15 years, was the top singles player as a member of the men’s tennis team at New York University in 1989 and 1990. He is also a working actor who has appeared in several films and daytime soap operas.

BETWEEN THE COVERSKIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) will have her article titled “The Correctional Educator: A Nontraditional Occupation” published in the May/June 2009 issue of Offender Programs Report, a publication from the Civic Research Institute that is devoted to “innovative programs, management strategies and legal developments in offender rehabilitation.”

SIMON BAATZ (History) had his book, For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb and the Murder that Shocked Chicago (HarperCollins), chosen as a finalist for the Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best Non-Fiction Crime Book in 2008. The award will

be presented by the Mystery Writers of America on April 30.

DAVID BROTHERTON (Sociology) had his book Keeping Out the Other: A Critical Introduction to Immigration Enforcement Today (Columbia University Press) cited as “Outstanding Academic Title for 2008” by Choice, the review magazine of the American Library Association. Brotherton co-edited the book along with Philip Kretsedemas of the University of Massachusetts.

PRESENTING…ADINA SCHWARTZ (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) made a Continuing Legal Education presentation on “Daubert Challenges to Firearms Identification” on January 10 at the Fifth National Seminar on Forensic Science and the Law, sponsored by the Office of Defender Services of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.

ELLEN BELCHER (Library) presented a paper titled “Is there a Halaf Bead and Pendant Typology? A Look at the Evidence” at the Bead Technology Workshop hosted by the British Museum in London, England, on January 12-13.

JANE KATZ (Physical Education and Athletics) conducted one-day clinics on “Swimming for Total Fitness and Swim Basics” at the Jewish Community Center in Tucson, AZ, on January 4 and The Club for Women, an all-women health club in Phoenix, on January 6.

M. VICTORIA PÉREZ-RÍOS (Government) presented two papers, “Cooperation against Transnational Crime: Lessons from the Balkans”

and “International Courts and Conflict Resolution: Toward a New Normative Framework, Social Justice and New Debates,” at the annual meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, held in New Orleans, LA, in early January. She also chaired a panel on Domestic Implications of International Law and served as a discussant on a panel on Pedagogy and Research.

PEER REVIEWSTACI STROBL (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) is one of the finalists for the Richard J. Terrill Paper of the Year Award to be presented in March by the

Flush with the success of John Jay’s first faculty-led study abroad programs last summer, four new courses will be offered by the College in 2009, in such locales as Korea, Greece, Mexico and the Dominican Republic.

The new study abroad programs are:¶ “Caribbean Cultural Criminology,” taught

by Professors Luis Barrios (Latin American and Latino/a Studies) and Douglas Thompkins (Sociology), meeting in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

¶ “Religious and Cultural Co-existence Among Christians, Jews and Muslims in Greece,” taught by Professor Effie Cochran (English), meeting in Thessaloniki, Greece.

¶ “Korean Art and Culture,” taught by Professor Thalia Vrachopoulos (Art and Music), meeting in Seoul and selected other cities in Korea.

¶ “Women in Mexico: Labor, Violence and Social Change,” taught by Professor Natalie J. Sokoloff (Sociology), meeting in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

Ken Lewandoski, the Director of International Studies and Programs, noted that the study abroad programs provide John Jay College academic credits, and qualify under the Study/Travel Opportunities for CUNY Students (STOCS) program, through which participating students can receive $750 to $1,500 in financial aid. (The deadline for STOCS applications is March 16.)

“These programs are academically rigorous,” Lewandoski said. “They are all designed to enhance a student’s chosen course of study.” The four-week programs include classroom lectures and discussions, field trips and presentations by

CUNY FIRST, a comprehensive array of applications that will streamline and enhance finance, personnel and student service processes, is coming to John Jay, and members of the Department of Human Resources are hoping to share with the rest of the College the various “wow! moments” they say are built into the system.

Addressing a Town Hall meeting on January 29, Christel Colón, the College’s Director of Human Resources, said the implementation of CUNY FIRST – which stands for Fully Integrated Resources and Services Tool – will be “a change for the better, the faster, the easier, the more accurate.” It will also represent a major step

Study Abroad Experienceto Go Farther Afield in 2009

local persons of interest.Housing arrangements will vary from one

program to the next, including apartments, dormitories or living with indigenous families.

All students will be required to attend a pre-departure orientation, and to share their experiences with the broader John Jay College community upon their return, Lewandoski said.

Application dates for the four courses vary. For more information on the study abroad opportunities, contact the appropriate faculty program directors, or Lewandoski at 212-484-1339, email [email protected].

The White Tower, one of Thessaloniki’s most famous archi-

tectural landmarks.

Hometown HeroesThe John Jay baseball program gave a tip of the collective cap on January 24 to two prominent members of the local base-

ball scene, at the annual Lou DeMartino Memorial Dinner. John Brant, a member of the John Jay Athletics Hall of Fame and

three-year team co-captain in the late 1970s, was presented with the Distinguished Baseball Alumni Award. Brant, a summa

cum laude graduate of John Jay and a decorated lieutenant with the Port Authority Police Department, told guests at the

fundraising dinner that “playing at John Jay was one of the greatest points of my life.” Lou Santos (right), a longtime figure

in sandlot baseball and youth baseball instruction, was honored with the Lou Demartino Lifetime Achievement Award. Dan

Palumbo, John Jay’s head baseball coach and interim Director of Athletics, presented the awards and served as the dinner’s

master of ceremonies.

toward making the College a more paperless operation.

“I can’t wait for the PAF bonfire,” she said, referring to the personnel action forms that would be phased out by the creation of an online reappointment process.

Praveen Panchal, John Jay’s Chief Information Officer, moderated the gathering and pointed out that existing CUNY systems are “archaic, difficult to maintain and failing every day. The lack of information in the existing systems, Panchal said, leads to enormous redundancy and inaccuracy.

According to Panchal, CUNY has more than 35,000 employees, with no comprehensive

human resources system. In addition, the University receives more than 10,000 job applications a year.

The Talent Acquisition Management (TAM) module of CUNY FIRST will be used to help streamline the hiring process, and then a Human Capital Management (HCM) module will come into play, handling a broad range of personnel functions such as time and leave, reappointment, and changes in personal information or status. The two modules will be the first human resources components to roll out, with an implementation target date of summer 2009.

The entire system, Panchal emphasized, is designed with privacy and security in mind.

Personal information can only be viewed by the individual in question and authorized College officials.

The new system’s potential for doing mass reappointments as opposed to processing them individually, and its “Quick Hire” function for speeding the process of hiring college assistants and adjuncts, were among the “wow! moments” noted by Colón, who underscored her own excitement with CUNY FIRST by adding that “I came into HR for the people, not the paperwork.”

CUNY FIRST is being launched in stages, with the entire system expected to be operational by the winter of 2010-2011.

CUNY FIRST Application Package Packs a Lot of “Wow!”

Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. Strobl was nominated for her paper “The Women’s Police Directorate in Bahrain,” which appeared in the International Criminal Justice Review Journal.

NISHAN PARLAKIAN (Communication and Theatre Arts, emeritus) received the St. Vartan Award from the Diocese of the Armenian Church of America (Eastern), for his lifelong achieve-ments in the performing arts. Archbishop Khajag Barsamian, Primate of the Diocese, said, “It is through individuals like [Parlakian] that the future of Armenian theater will remain vibrant among the next generation of Armenian Americans.”

Researchunder Glass

A student pauses to take in the latest gallery display in the lobby of Haaren Hall, an

eight-panel salute to student-faculty research efforts. The exhibit features faculty mem-

bers and students representing a broad range of disciplines, from hard science to the

humanities, from criminal justice to computing.


January 28, 2009

Worth NotingFebruary 2-3 8:30 PM4th Annual Guggenheim Conference on Crimein AmericaA New Beginning Exploring the Criminal Justice Challenges for the Next Four Years.Presented by the Center on Media, Crime and Justice. Includes presentation ofthe annual John Jay Excellence in Journalism Awards.

Room 630, Haaen Hall

February 3 7:30 PMHappy Birthday,Felix Mendelssohn!A concert celebrating the 200thbirthday of the Romantic composer. Narrated by Eli Wallach.


February 20 10:00 AM - 4:30 PMForensic Linguistics for Investigative PractitionersA workshop presented by the Center for Modern Forensic Practice andthe John Jay Department of English.RSVP to [email protected].

Room 630 Haaren Hall

February 23 12:30 PM - 3:00 PMMaking (Much) Better Senseof the Culture of Black Menin CrisisDr. Alford Young Jr.University of MichiganCo-sponsored by the Department of Sociology, Department of African American Studies, Gender Studies Program, CUNY Black Male Initiative and the Center on Race, Crime and Justice.


Since 9/11, John Jay has aggressively focused on developing programs to meet the changing security imperatives of the private sector. The opening of the Center for Business Preparedness is the latest addition to this strategy. This research hub will be led by a recognized expert in corporate security and business risk management.

Thomas E. Cavanagh, whose appointment was announced by President Jeremy Travis on January 22, comes to John Jay from The Conference Board (TCB), where he was Senior Research Associate, having joined TCB’s research staff in 1998.

“With corporate security expert Tom Cavanagh as its director, the Center on Business Preparedness will be able to offer a comprehensive program of research and networking opportunities that will keep practitioners abreast of the latest developments and enable them to benchmark their efforts against the prevailing standards,” Travis said.

Cavanagh, who holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Yale University, has served as principal investigator for a number of major reports on corporate security and preparedness, including “Corporate Security Management: Organization and Spending Since 9/11,” “Navigating Risk: The Business Case for Security” and the forthcoming “Preparedness in the Private Sector.”

“The field of business preparedness is relatively new and is evolving very rapidly,”

Cavanagh observed. “It incorporates a lot of different elements, ranging from routine security management to business continuity and disaster recovery. At John Jay, we will be able to draw on an extensive body of expertise on protection management, emergency response, cybercrime and terrorism to create a dynamic and exciting program on business preparedness.

“John Jay has a tradition of effectively integrating top-quality research with practical experience, so it is an excellent home for this new program, and I look forward to the challenge of developing it,” Cavanagh said.

As a research and information clearinghouse, the Center for Business Preparedness will explore best practices, preparedness standards and procedures, and analyses of public safety and corporate security strategies. Its first initiative, undertaken in conjunction with The Conference Board, will be an in-depth examination of preparedness in the private sector. Researchers will interview corporate security executives to determine the extent to which specific

Twenty-two employees were honored as the latest winners of the Bravo! Employee Recognition Awards on December 19.

“I don’t often get a chance to say to a group of employees like the ones we have here how appreciative I am of all your hard work,” said President Jeremy Travis. “You have strengthened

the core values of this institution.”The third semiannual group of divisional

Bravo! award winners were recognized for their “new and creative ideas, innovative problem-solving and superior customer service,” said Robert Pignatello, Senior Vice President for Finance and Administration. Pignatello went on to note that a new wellness and work life initiative will soon be unveiled at John Jay, as an outgrowth of the successful Bravo! Summer Institute launched in 2008.

The College’s vice presidents were called to the podium in alphabetical order to introduce the employees in their units who were to receive the Bravo! awards. The winners were:

Academic Affairs: Priscilla Acuna (Interdisciplinary Studies Program), David Barnet (Office of Educational Partnerships), Esperanza Lopez-Herrera (Department of Government),

A great college, like a great city, deserves a great performing-arts program, and with that in mind, John Jay’s Gerald W. Lynch Theater has unveiled its Spring 2009 Series of concerts, plays and other events.

The season commences on February 3 with a 200th birthday salute to Felix Mendelssohn, who is perhaps best known for his “Wedding March,” originally composed as incidental music for a production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The free concert narrated by actor Eli Wallach will include selections from the string octets Mendelssohn wrote as a youth, arias from his oratorio “Elijah,” and his Trio for Piano in D Minor.

Another bicentennial — that of the death of composer Joseph Haydn — will be marked in a series of performances beginning February 18, as the Gotham Chamber Opera presents the New York City stage premiere of Haydn’s L’isola Disabitata (Desert Island). The production, directed by acclaimed choreographer Mark Morris, will also be presented on February 21, 25, 27 and 28.

Theatre, theology and the judicial process collide when the Department of Communication and Theatre Arts, in conjunction with the APACHE Project, presents The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, directed by Professor Dana Tarantino. The serio-comic play, which will be performed

from April 21-25, takes an imagined look at the plight and fate of the New Testament’s most notorious sinner in a trial of “God and the Kingdom of Heaven and Earth v. Judas Iscariot.”

The Spring 2009 Series also includes:¶ Water, Our Most Precious Resource, a

narrated free concert of traditional spirituals, gospel and folk music to celebrate World Water Day on March 22;

¶ “Killadelphia,” the latest work from award-winning playwright and performer Sean Christopher Lewis, which runs April 29, 30 and May 1, and uses hip-hop and documentary theater techniques to tell the story of murdered teaching fellow Beau Zabel;

¶ Culturefest!, a weeklong festival of performances and events from March 2-5 to celebrate John Jay’s cultural diversity;

¶ Ballet Academy East presenting the spring performance by its Pre-professional Division, May 22-24, with works choreographed by leading artists of the dance world;

¶ Barnes & Noble Storytelling Hour, on February 4, March 18 and April 8, a special story time for children and caregivers.

Complete details of coming events, including times and ticketing information, are on the theater Web site, www.jjay.cuny.edu/theater. E-mail [email protected] to get regular updates about events.

Music, Drama and MoreFill the Theater’s Spring Bill

The newest recipients of the Bravo! Employee Recognition Awards, joined by Senior Vice President Robert Pignatello and

President Travis, have plenty of reason to smile after they were honored on December 19.

College Says Bravo! to Latest Groupof Employees Who Go the Extra Mile

New Center Focuses on the Private Sector’sChanging Security-Preparedness Needs

Ashton Franklyn (Criminal Justice Center), Susy Mendes (Office of Sponsored Programs);

Student Development: William Altham (Health Services), Ma’at Lewis Coles (Counseling Center), Premwati Sukhan (Office of Internships and Cooperative Education);

Finance and Administration: Yagris Diaz (Bursar’s Office), Christine Johnson (Human Resources), Ynes Leon (Facilities Management), Cadelie Neat (Business Office), Louie Perillo (Department of Information Technology), Shirley Robinson (Mailroom), Barbara Wala (Security);

Enrollment Management: Crystal Brathwaite (One-Stop Center), Ariel Del Rosario (One-Stop Center), Dawn Layne (Registrar), Mariela Nuñez (Graduate Admissions), David Primak (Registrar), Sara Scaldaferry (Registrar);

Strategic Planning: Gail Hauss (Institutional Research).

preparedness standards have been implemented. The project will also gather and report data on corporate procedures for emergency response, disaster recovery and crisis management.

The research will be funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to The Conference Board.

“We’re delighted to see that the work we began here will continue in partnership with John Jay, and we congratulate them on the establishment of the Center,” said David J. Vidal, founder of The Conference Board’s security and preparedness research programs and director of its Center for Corporate Citizenship & Sustainability.

Thomas E. Cavanagh (left), director

of John Jay’s new Center for Busi-

ness Preparedness, and the cover

of one of his recent reports for The

Conference Board.


@ John Jay is published by the Department of Institutional Advancement







BETWEEN THE COVERSSIMON BAATZ (History) had his book, For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb and the Murder that Shocked Chicago (HarperCollins) chosen by USA Today as one of its 10 Best Books for 2008. Jonathan Yardley, the book critic for The Washington Post, chose For the Thrill of It as one of the Top 15 Books for 2008, and R.V. Scheide of The Sacramento News & Review selected Baatz’s book as one of the year’s Best 55 Books.

JOCK YOUNG (Sociology) had his new book, Cultural Criminology: An Invitation, written with Jeff Ferrell and Keith Hayward, published by Sage. The book was launched in November at the American Society of Criminology meeting in St. Louis.

JILL STAUFFER (Philosophy), who is currently on fellowship in residence at the Graduate Center, has had her new book, Nietzsche and Levinas: “After the Death of a Certain God,” published by Columbia University Press. The volume was co-edited with Bettina Bergo.

JANE KATZ (Physical Education and Athletics) had her article “Joint-Friendly Water Workout” published in the October/November 2008 issue of Arthritis Health Monitor. Her article on “The Healthy Swimmer” appeared in the November/December issue of USMS Swimmer magazine.

ADINA SCHWARTZ (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) published Parts 1 and 2 of her article “Challenging Firearms and Toolmark Identification” in the October and November/December issues of The Champion, the journal of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Part 1 was the cover story in the October issue. The articles are also scheduled to be reprinted in The California Defender.

PRESENTING…MICHAEL PFEIFER (History) presented a paper titled “The Midwestern Making of Racial Lynching: The Lynching of African-Americans in the Civil War and Reconstruction” at the American Historical Association meeting in New York City on January 3. Pfeifer previously presented a paper, “Lynching, Law, and Sectional Identity in the Antebellum Border States” on October 25 in Louisville, KY, at the Filson Institute Academic Conference on Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis.

JOCK YOUNG (Sociology) gave a series of six lectures during a recent visit to Argentina. He was the introductory plenary speaker at the international seminar on “Rethinking the Role of the State in Crime Prevention,” hosted

by the Federal Secretariat of Public Safety. He addressed the Social Cabinet of the Province of Santa Fe on policies of social inclusion in the field of crime control; spoke at the Universities of Buenos Aires and Rosario on his recent book The Vertigo of Late Modernity; and presented his research on multiagency crime prevention to the U.N. Development Program on local initiatives in this area. While there, he also had productive meetings with the National Director of Criminal Policy and the director of the U.N. program regarding future research on crime and social exclusion.

JANE KATZ (Physical Education and Athletics) presented a talk on “Health and Exercise Through the Holidays” on December 17 as part of the David Rogers Health Policy Colloquium at New York Weill Cornell Medical Center.

HOWARD PFLANZER (Communication and Theatre Arts) had readings of his plays UFO Story and The Flowers Sing: Strindberg’s Dream presented by the Living Theatre in Manhattan on December 2.

PEER REVIEWKIMORA (Law, Police Science and Criminal Justice Administration) was appointed to the board of directors of OPEN Inc. (Offender Preparation & Education Network, Inc.), a correctional service agency founded in Dallas, TX, in 1979. “We are thrilled Dr. Kimora has agreed to serve on our board,” said the organization’s executive director, Ned Rollo. “She brings a national and academic perspective to us.”

DUANE GREEN (Facilities Management) won the heavyweight title in the biennial Tournament of Champions amateur boxing competition held at Nassau Coliseum in December. Green, who trains at the Young Boxing Association (YBA) gym in the Bronx, chalked up two technical knockouts and one decision en route to the championship. In the first round, he scored a TKO over the fighter who had defeated him for the title two years ago.

Gary Brady, a shooting guard with the John

Jay men’s basketball team, knows how to

“pay it forward,” and prominent media

outlets have taken notice. Brady, a junior on

the team that last year won the first CUNY

Athletic Conference championship in program

history, was the subject of a feature report

on the MSG network on December 20, which

focused on his work at the same group home

in the Bronx where he grew up. His story

has also been told on the Web site d3hoops.

com, which covers Division III collegiate

basketball. Brady was just 9 years old when

he began living at the Andrus group home,

and he is now in his third year as a counselor

at the facility, working an overnight shift

four nights a week. His days are filled with a

full-time class load, studying and homework,

and during basketball season, practices and

games. He credits his success to the guidance

provided by his own counselors, mentors

and coaches, who he says “made time for

everything.” Brady now makes the same

time as mentor for scores of youngsters in

the same situation he once faced. The cable

TV report appeared on MSG Network’s

“Aéropostale College Basketball Weekly”

show. A link to the MSG video will appear

soon on the John Jay Athletics Web site,

www.johnjayathletics.com. For the d3hoops

online article, “Mature Beyond His Years,”

visit www.d3hoops.com/nation/09/dec18.htm.

As scholarship students go, Michael Yusupov is more fortunate than most. During the midyear break in January, while classmates were enjoy-ing a respite from their studies, Yusupov was in Washington, DC, participating in a 10-day academic seminar tied in to the historic inaugura-tion of Barack Obama as the nation’s 44th Presi-dent on January 20.

The Campaign 2008 Presidential Aca-demic Seminar Series comprises four separate academically tailored seminars in conjunction with the 2008 presidential campaign, of which the Presidential Inauguration session is the last. Sponsored by the Washington Center for Intern-ships and Academic Seminars, the series has been held every four years since 1984.

The highly competitive seminar offered Yusupov a backstage look at the 2008 presi-dential inauguration, focusing on the new president and the formation of his administra-tion, and the impact of the media on American politics. Through a combination of lectures, site visits, tours, and special events, Yusupov and the other participating students and faculty explored the critical issues surrounding the transfer of power, the political processes involved, and how the nation’s leaders are responding to the out-come of the 2008 elections.

The seminars “are designed for the elite col-lege or university student who has or yearns for a heightened sense of civic engagement and will enjoy interacting with internationally recognized figures including politicians, journalists, profes-sionals and many more,” according to the Web site www.campaign2008.info.

“This is a first-rate program, with many learn-ing opportunities, culminating in the inaugura-tion itself,” President Jeremy Travis said in an e-mail to Yusupov, a senior BA/MA student in public administration. “We are so proud that you have been selected for this scholarship opportunity.”

Brady Scores, On and Off the Court

Welcome to the College Experience

Students show off the research projects they created as part of their Freshman Opportunity class taught by Professors Kimberly Helmer and Marco Navarro. “A year ago, as a senior in high school, I never would’ve dreamed I’d be doing this,” said Heidy

Ramirez (at left in photo above right). The students will undertake new team-based research projects in the spring semester, choosing from a broad palette of course options.

Inauguration Provides Study Opportunity of a Lifetime

2009 Newsletter Archive

Documents

Transcript of 2009 Newsletter Archive