Keith Fink

Last updated
Keith Fink
KAF.jpg
Born
Education University of California, Los Angeles (BA)
Southwestern Law School (JD)
Occupation(s) Attorney, author, academic
Website www.finklawfirm.com

Keith Fink is an American attorney, author, and academic. He represented clients in a contract dispute with Ellen DeGeneres dubbed by the media as "Iggygate". [1]

Contents

In 2017, Fink became embroiled in a dispute with the University of California at Los Angeles regarding the non-renewal of his contract. [2] [3]

Fink is the author of two books: Free Speech in the Workplace and Sex, Politics, and Race: Free Speech on Campus.

Biography

Keith Fink was born in Santa Monica, California and grew up in Bel Air, California. He attended University High School and then went to college at the University of California, Los Angeles. [4] Fink has won many debate tournaments. [5] As juniors, Fink and his debate partner Lisa Allred set the single season college debate record for most tournament wins in a year. [5]

After college, Fink taught debate at the Harvard-Westlake School while also editing a college debate handbook called Fink's Files, which provided analysis and arguments on the yearly college debate topic. Fink also taught Speech at Stephen S. Wise Temple. [5]

Fink subsequently earned a Juris Doctor degree from Southwestern Law School and was admitted to the State Bar of California. [6]

Fink began his legal career as an associate attorney at Cotkin, Collins & Franscell. He subsequently joined Kindel & Anderson. Fink later joined Baker & Hostetler. [7] During Fink's early years as an attorney, he successfully prosecuted numerous 42 U.S.C. § 1983 cases, leading to one that was heard by the Supreme Court of California in which Fink's client prevailed. [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14]

Fink's focus has gradually expanded to labor, employment, business, and commercial litigation. In March 1997, Fink founded Keith A. Fink & Associates, a boutique litigation firm that primarily handles employment discrimination law, labor, business, civil rights, and entertainment law matters.[ citation needed ]

Teaching

Fink began teaching as an adjunct professor at Southwestern Law School in 1993. He taught Civil Rights & Civil Liberties, Labor Law, Employment Discrimination, and Pretrial Civil Practice. [15]

In the 2007-2008 academic year, Fink stopped teaching at Southwestern Law School and began teaching at UCLA, his alma mater. For the next decade, Fink's teaching focused on the First Amendment, freedom of speech, employment law, entertainment law, and debate. Fink designed and taught four [16] courses: Race, Sex & Politics: Free Speech on Campus; Free Speech in the Workplace; Entertainment Law; [17] and Abortion, Gun Control, and the Death Penalty: Arguing Contemporary Social Issues. [18] [19]

Throughout the first half of 2017, Fink was engaged in an academic freedom dispute with UCLA administrators, leading to Laura E. Gómez (the former Dean of Social Sciences) opting not to promote him to Continuing Lecturer, effectively ending his employment with the Department of Communication Studies on June 30, 2017. [3]

Related Research Articles

Attorney–client privilege or lawyer–client privilege is the common law doctrine of legal professional privilege in the United States. Attorney–client privilege is "[a] client's right to refuse to disclose and to prevent any other person from disclosing confidential communications between the client and the attorney."

Student rights are those rights, such as civil, constitutional, contractual and consumer rights, which regulate student rights and freedoms and allow students to make use of their educational investment. These include such things as the right to free speech and association, to due process, equality, autonomy, safety and privacy, and accountability in contracts and advertising, which regulate the treatment of students by teachers and administrators. There is very little scholarship about student rights throughout the world. In general most countries have some kind of student rights enshrined in their laws and proceduralized by their court precedents. Some countries, like Romania, in the European Union, have comprehensive student bills of rights, which outline both rights and how they are to be proceduralized. Most countries, however, like the United States and Canada, do not have a cohesive bill of rights and students must use the courts to determine how rights precedents in one area apply in their own jurisdictions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1996 California Proposition 209</span> Referendum banning affirmative action

Proposition 209 is a California ballot proposition which, upon approval in November 1996, amended the state constitution to prohibit state governmental institutions from considering race, sex, or ethnicity, specifically in the areas of public employment, public contracting, and public education. Modeled on the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the California Civil Rights Initiative was authored by two California academics, Glynn Custred and Tom Wood. It was the first electoral test of affirmative action policies in North America. It passed with 55% in favor to 45% opposed, thereby banning affirmative action in the state's public sector.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Milan Smith</span> American judge (born 1942)

Milan Dale Smith, Jr. is an American attorney and jurist serving as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Smith's brother, Gordon H. Smith, was a Republican U.S. Senator from 1997 to 2009. Milan Smith is neither a Republican nor a Democrat, and he considers himself to be a political independent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephen Reinhardt</span> American judge (1931–2018)

Stephen Roy Reinhardt was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, with chambers in Los Angeles, California. He was the last federal appeals court judge in active service to have been appointed to his position by President Jimmy Carter.

The Center for Individual Rights (CIR) is a non-profit public interest law firm in the United States. Based in Washington, D.C., the firm is "dedicated to the defense of individual liberties against the increasingly aggressive and unchecked authority of federal and state governments". The Center is officially nonpartisan. Its work focuses on enforcement of constitutional limits on state and federal power, primarily through litigation.

Robert David Sack is a senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephen Yagman</span> American lawyer

Stephen Yagman is an American federal civil rights lawyer, who also handles criminal defense and habeas corpus matters. He has a reputation for being an exceptionally zealous advocate in cases regarding allegations of police brutality. He has argued hundreds of federal civil rights cases before a jury, and has been involved in over a hundred and fifty federal appeals and certiorari petitions before the United States Supreme Court.

Pro se legal representation means to argue on one's own behalf in a legal proceeding, as a defendant or plaintiff in civil cases, or a defendant in criminal cases, rather than have representation from counsel or an attorney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Consuelo Bland Marshall</span> American judge (born 1936)

Consuelo Bland Marshall is a senior United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Robart</span> American judge (born 1947)

James Louis Robart is a senior United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington.

Laura E. Gómez is a professor at the School of Law at the University of California, Los Angeles where she also holds appointments in Sociology and the Department of Chicana & Chicano Studies and Central American Studies.

The issue of school speech or curricular speech as it relates to the First Amendment to the United States Constitution has been the center of controversy and litigation since the mid-20th century. The First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech applies to students in the public schools. In the landmark decision Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, the U.S. Supreme Court formally recognized that students do not "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marc Randazza</span> American First Amendment attorney

Marc J. Randazza is an American First Amendment attorney and a legal commentator on InfoWars.

<i>American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression v. Strickland</i> Judgment on Constitutional issue

American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression v. Strickland, 560 F.3d 443, is a decision of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals involving a constitutional challenge—both facially and as-applied to internet communications—to an Ohio statute prohibiting the dissemination or display to juveniles of certain sexually-explicit materials or performances. The Sixth Circuit panel declined to resolve the constitutional issue but, instead, certified two questions to the Ohio Supreme Court regarding the interpretation of the statute. The Ohio Supreme Court answered both questions affirmatively and placed a narrowing construction on the statute. Since the Ohio Supreme Court's decision, the Sixth Circuit has not reheard the case.

I. Nelson Rose is an internationally known author and public speaker, and is recognized as one of the world's leading experts on gambling and gaming law. He is currently a Professor Emeritus at Whittier College and a Visiting Professor at the University of Macau. Rose is best known for his internationally syndicated column and 1986 book, Gambling and the Law. To further educate and inform on the subject, he also maintains a comprehensive website, "Gambling and the Law," which can be found at www.gamblingandthelaw.com.

The ministerial exception, sometimes known as the ecclesiastical exception, is a legal doctrine in the United States barring the application of anti-discrimination laws to religious institutions' employment of ministers or as to jobs with ministerial roles. As explained by the Supreme Court in the landmark 2012 case Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. E.E.O.C., the exception is drawn from the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and serves two purposes: to safeguard the freedom of religious groups "to select their own ministers" and to prevent "government involvement in [...] ecclesiastical decisions". The first purpose is rooted in the Free Exercise Clause; the second, in the Establishment Clause. When the ministerial exception applies, it gives religious institutions an affirmative defense against lawsuits for discrimination. For example, a woman seeking to become a Catholic priest cannot sue the Catholic Church for sex discrimination over its position that women cannot be ordained as priests. The Supreme Court later elaborated on when employees qualify as ministerial – and thus how broadly the exception applies – in Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru (2020).

Givhan v. Western Line Consolidated School District, 439 U.S. 410 (1979), is a United States Supreme Court decision on the free speech rights of public employees. The Court held unanimously in favor of a schoolteacher fired for her critical remarks in conversations with her principal. Justice William Rehnquist wrote the opinion, with a short concurrence by John Paul Stevens.

Raymond Paul Boucher is an American trial attorney. Throughout his career, Boucher has represented clients in a wide range of matters including consumer litigation, construction defect litigation, product liability, toxic tort litigation and employment discrimination. He served as lead attorney in the landmark $660-million sexual-abuse settlement with the Catholic archdiocese where he represented over 250 abuse victims in the July 2007 settlement. He was able to help secure over one billion dollars in recovery for victims of abuse by Catholic Priests in Southern California.

References

  1. "A Dog Gone Shame - Animals & Pets, Ellen, Coping and Overcoming Illness, Ellen DeGeneres : People.com". web.archive.org. 2011-03-01. Retrieved 2024-07-09.
  2. McLaughlin, Sarah (2017-08-04). "FIRE questions UCLA's firing of lecturer Keith Fink". www.thefire.org. Retrieved 2024-07-09.
  3. 1 2 Brown, Sarah (July 1, 2017), "Why Did a UCLA Instructor With a Popular Free-Speech Course Lose His Job?", Chronicle of Higher Education
  4. "UCLA Communication Studies". www.commstudies.ucla.edu. Archived from the original on 2017-09-12. Retrieved 2017-09-11.
  5. 1 2 3 "Room For Debate - Keith A. Fink". www.roomfordebate.info. Archived from the original on 2017-09-12. Retrieved 2017-09-11.
  6. "Attorney Licensee Profile: Keith Allen Fink". 22 Jun 2019. Retrieved 22 Jun 2019.
  7. "Baker | The American Lawyer". www.americanlawyer.com. Retrieved 2017-09-12.
  8. "Williams v. Superior Court, 852 P.2d 377 (Cal. 1993)".
  9. "Romberg v. Nichols 953 F.2d 1152 (9th Cir.)".
  10. "Credit Managers Association v. Kennesaw Life Ins., 25 F.3d 743 (9th Cir 1994)".
  11. "Wilks v. Reyes, 5 F.3d 412 (9th Cir. 1993)".
  12. "Alliance Ins. Co. v. Colella, 995 F.2d 944 (9th Cir. 1993)".
  13. "Brooks v. Cook, 938 F.2d 1048 (9th Cir. 1991)".
  14. "Grant-Burton v. Covenant Care, 99 Cal. App. 4th 1361 (2002)".
  15. "Faculty Guide" (PDF), Southwestern Law School, 2007, archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-12-13, retrieved 2012-04-02
  16. UCLA Media, Daily Bruin (2017), Keith Fink Bruinwalk Reviews
  17. "COMM ST 164 - Entertainment Law". UCLA Department of Communication Studies. 2015-09-07. Archived from the original on 2015-09-07. Retrieved 2017-08-29.
  18. "COMM ST 184 - Abortion, Gun Control, and the Death Penalty". UCLA Communication Studies. 2016-08-09. Archived from the original on 2015-09-07.
  19. "UCLA Communications Department", UCLA, 2010