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2025 Chapman Law Review Symposium

ยป The Annual Chapman Law Review Symposium

Every spring since 1999, Fowler School of Law's Chapman Law Review has hosted its annual Law Review Symposium. Topics are selected to challenge participants to confront pressing legal issues from a variety of perspectives. Panelists have included distinguished scholars, judges and practitioners.

2025 SYMPOSIUM

Raiders of the Lost Art: Legal Challenges and Recoveries

Friday, January 31, 2025

 

9:30 a.m. CHECK-IN


10:15 - 11:45 a.m.: PANEL 1: THE JOURNEY HOME
The cultural community experience of looted art reclamation. The panelists will discuss notable pieces of art and the state of the law affecting their return status.

Kathryn “Lee” Boyd, Partner, Hecht Partners

Dr. John Hall, Professor of Law, Chapman University, Fowler School of Law

Dr. Leslye Obiora, Professor of Law, University Of Arizona, James E. Rogers College Of Law

Moderator: Professor Justin St. P. Walsh, Professor of Art History, Archaeology, and Space Studies, Chapman University, Wilkinson College Of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; Department of Art



12 p.m. - 1 p.m.: KEYNOTE ADDRESS:  IS THIS CULTURAL PROPERTY LAW? THE EMERGING NORM OF VOLUNTARY REPATRIATIONS.

Professor Erin L. Thompson, Professor of Art Crime, John Jay College (CUNY)


1:15 p.m. – 2:30 p.m: PANEL 2: THE QUEST FOR ACCOUNTABILITY
The struggles that come with prosecuting bad actors involved in looted art. The panelists will discuss methods museums use to stay in compliance in light of the recent movement for provenance transparency and cultural restitution.

Jason Felch, Investigative Reporter and Subject Matter Expert, Museum of Looted Antiquities

Nicholas M. O'Donnell, Partner, Sullivan & Worcester

Dylan Price, Partner, Sheppard Mullin

Moderator: Professor Michael Bazyler, Professor of Law, 1939 Law Scholar in Holocaust and Human Rights Studies, Chapman University, Fowler School of Law


2:30 p.m. – 4:00 p.m: EN BANC
Refreshments and hors d’oeuvres will be served immediately following the last panel in the Kennedy Hall Lobby.

4:00 p.m.

SYMPOSIUM CONCLUDES


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Tickets & Registration

Previous Keynote Speakers

  • United States Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr.
  • Former Nixon White House Counsel John Dean
  • Former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese III
  • Steven Schwarcz, Stanley A. Star Professor of Law and Business, Duke University
  • Former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff
  • Michael Flaherty, President of Walden Media
  • Damien Riehl, TEDx Speaker
John O. McGinnis
Keynote Speaker

Erin L. Thompson, Professor Of Art Crime, John Jay College (CUNY)

Erin L. Thompson holds a PhD in classical art history and a JD, both from Columbia University, along with a certificate in Global Business Law from the Institut d’Études Politiques and Paris I (Sorbonne). After working as a lawyer for Hogan Lovells and the Conflicts of Interest Board of the City of New York, she is now a professor of art crime at John Jay College (City University of New York).

Thompson studies the damage done to cultural heritage and communities through looting, theft, and deliberate destruction of cultural heritage (as well as its deliberate preservation). She is the author of Possession: The Curious History of Private Collectors and Smashing Statues: The Rise and Fall of American Monuments. She is a member of the Advisory Committee for the Nepal Heritage Recovery Campaign and has assisted authorities, activists, and collectors in numerous repatriation cases in the United States and abroad.