About Karin Benne

Karin Benne Articles written 5

Articles written by Karin Benne

Handling the Disaster After the Disaster

Judy Guice fights for victims of Katrina and the oil spill

Many lawyers say they know what their clients are going through, but personal injury attorney Judy Guice, whose clients include victims of disaster on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, means it. “I lost my house in Hurricane Katrina,” she says. “It doesn’t get any more personal than that. My home was completely destroyed down to the slab, so I knew exactly the anguish my clients were going through.” That includes what she calls “the disaster after the disaster”: the response of …

His Roots Run Deep

Isaac K. Byrd Jr. is a force for racial equality and freedom of expression in his home state of Mississippi

When the landmark Ayers v. Waller class action suit was first filed in a Mississippi court in January of 1975, recent college graduate and Mississippi native Isaac K. Byrd Jr. was 700 miles away, pursuing his law degree at Northwestern University. From his first day of study in Chicago, he’d always planned to return to his home state to bring change for its African-American citizens still feeling the sting of racial injustice. He just didn’t know that the change had already started. The …

Chip and Charge

Chip Welch takes on Walmart and the Air Force

When a federal judge granted class action status to a multimillion-dollar civil rights discrimination case against Walmart in 2007, he made Morgan “Chip” Welch a very happy man. Welch and his fellow plaintiffs’ attorneys had challenged Walmart’s hiring practices for truck drivers, which they argued were subjective and led to disproportionate numbers of black drivers being turned away––no small slight, considering Walmart operates one of the largest private transportation fleets in …

Taking the Bull by the Horns

John Burnett fights for his clients' First Amendment freedoms  

John Burnett's first case as a cooperating attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union was exactly the kind of case he loves. In 1982, First Lady Nancy Reagan planned to pay a visit to Little Rock Central High School. One student, a senior named Beckey Avery, was less than thrilled. She opposed the Reagan administration's support of private school tuition vouchers and wanted to hand out fliers on the sidewalk in protest. The school's administration was not amused. "I can't remember what …

Type A

Bobby McDaniel on Whitewater, medical malpractice and flying blind

Since August 2006, attorneys-to-be at the University of Arkansas School of Law have honed their mock trial skills in a technologically advanced practice room. Called the Bobby McDaniel Trial Practice Classroom, the facility is named for the alumnus and trial attorney who’s one of their sources of inspiration. And if the aspiring lawyers do half as well in their careers as McDaniel has, they’ll have something to be proud of.   Born and raised in Jonesboro, Ark., McDaniel worked construction …

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