Class of 1965
(Notes posted in the order they were received, with the newest posts on top.)
Leslie A. Nicholson was appointed general counsel of the Government Services Administration by the White House, effective June 9, 2008. Previously, Les was executive vice-president and general counsel of Chevy Chase Bank and prior to that, chairman of the Litigation Department at Shaw Pittman Potts and Trowbridge, now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman in Washington, D.C. He continues to serve as the president of the International Lawn Tennis Club of the United States, which is celebrating its 75th anniversary by hosting tennis teams from 20 other countries in Washington, D.C. from August 24 through August 29, 2008. Les and his wife, Laureen, live in Chevy Chase, Maryland, near their children, Erin Nicholson Ortiz (and her two sons, ages 2 and 6 months) and John L. Nicholson, JD/MBA '95.
Posted on website 8-1-08
William J. Rudloff was selected as one of the American Trial Lawyers Association's Top 100 Trial Lawyers from Kentucky.
A scathing report by Mr. Shaheen in 1993, which accused FBI Director William S. Sessions of misuse of government property, led to President Bill Clinton's dismissal of Sessions. In 1989, Mr. Shaheen wrote a 61-page report that said former attorney general Edwin Meese III had engaged in "conduct which should not be tolerated of any government employee, especially not the attorney general."
As the founding director of the Office of Professional Responsibility, Mr. Shaheen conducted investigations of high-ranking Cabinet officials, senior White House employees and more than one president. A job that he thought would run no more than a year lasted 22 years through the tenure of eight attorneys general.
"He was a straight arrow, he was a professional in every sense of the word and he took his job very seriously," former FBI and CIA director William H. Webster said Friday. "He was the go-to guy on any kind of ethical inquiry."
Mr. Shaheen challenged the appearance of oil and gas tax shelters held by Attorney General William French Smith and rebuked Attorney General Benjamin R. Civiletti, who had denied that he had discussed the investigation of Billy Carter, a registered foreign agent for Libya, with his brother, President Jimmy Carter.
He attacked the Clinton White House in testimony before the House Government Reform and Oversight Committee in 1995 for its failure to cooperate in his investigation of firings in the White House travel office.
His office had asked for two years for diaries or journals kept by deputy White House counsel Vincent Foster, who committed suicide during the investigation. But it was while reading a magazine article that Mr. Shaheen learned that Foster had kept a daily log that the administration had not turned over, he told the committee.
In addition to investigating headline names, Mr. Shaheen and his office also examined misconduct in the ranks of the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Border Patrol, Bureau of Prisons and U.S. Marshals Service.
However, his credibility stemmed from his willingness to tackle the misdeeds of top officials, and not just those of the less-powerful. In 1978, his office published the Justice Department's first report on abuses by longtime FBI director J. Edgar Hoover and his inner circle. Mr. Shaheen said at the time that "there definitely would have been prosecutions if the statute of limitations hadn't run." Hoover died in 1972.
Colleagues said Mr. Shaheen's style helped explain how he managed to hold the watchdog position for so long. "He combined a Southern courtliness with an explosive sense of humor, the kind of appreciation usually associated with knee-slapper jokes," said journalist and author Ronald J. Ostrow.
Mr. Shaheen was born in Boston and grew up in Mississippi. He graduated from Yale University and in 1965 received a law degree from Vanderbilt University. He clerked for a federal judge in Tennessee and practiced law in Como, Miss., where he was elected mayor while still in his 20s.
He practiced law in Memphis before joining the Justice Department in 1973 in the civil rights division. Two years later, he was special counsel for intelligence to Attorney General Edward H. Levi. Levi established the Office of Professional Responsibility at the end of 1975.
At the time of its establishment, the office was the only agency in the executive branch that could start administrative and criminal internal investigations. It never had more than 35 lawyers, but it conducted thousands of examinations.
After his resignation in 1997, Mr. Shaheen served as chief counsel and deputy executive director of the congressionally mandated Commission on the Advancement of Federal Law Enforcement. He was also special investigative counsel for an independent review of the Internal Revenue Service's criminal investigation division. In 2000, he became senior counselor to then-IRS Commissioner Charles O. Rossotti.
He received the Presidential Rank Award for Distinguished Service and two Meritorious Service Awards.
Survivors include his wife, Polly Shaheen of Falls Church; three sons, Michael Shaheen III of Ithaca, N.Y., Timothy Shaheen of Falls Church and Francisco Macedo of Atlanta; four half sisters; a half brother; and three grandchildren.
A former member of the Tennessee State House of Representatives representing Tullahoma, Majors came from the royal family of Tennessee football. His late father, Shirley Majors, was the head coach at the University of the South in Sewanee for 21 years and was a charter inductee into the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame. Three of Majors' brothers played at the University of Tennessee, the best-known being Johnny Majors, who went on to coach UT for many years.
No slouch on the football field himself, Joe Majors played college football at the University of Alabama and at Florida State University. In 1960, he joined the Houston Oilers in the charter season of the American Football League. He played one season there as a quarterback and defensive back.
Majors lobbied for Atlanta-based Community Loans of America, the Tennessee Consumer Finance Association, the Tennessee Hotel and Lodging Association, the Tennessee Oil Marketers Association, and the Tennessee Pawnbrokers Association. He was also a founding member of the Tennessee Lobbyist Association.
Majors is survived by his wife Elizabeth Scokin, sons Frank and Inman, brothers Johnny, Bobby, and Larry, and sister Shirley Ann Husband.
Samuel G. McNamara has been appointed by Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher to fill the unexpired term of Franklin County Circuit Judge Roger Crittenden, who retired in June. "I am pleased that Judge McNamara has stepped up and offered his services to the citizens of Franklin County," Fletcher said in a statement. Forty years as an attorney "make him especially well suited for this role." A native of Danville, Kentucky, Judge McNamara has practiced law in Frankfort since 1966.
Frank Drowota retired as Chief Justice of the Tennessee Supreme Court in June 2005, after 35 years on the bench, including service in the Davidson County Chancery Court and the Tennessee Court of Appeals. In late June 2006, the Tennessee Bar Association announced that it had named a new annual award for outstanding judicial service after Drowota, who is also the first recipient of the Justice Frank F. Drowota III Award for Outstanding Judicial Service. This past year, Drowota chaired a TBA committee that worked to develop a code conduct to govern judicial campaigns.
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