Clare E. Conners Nominated for U.S. Attorney for District of Hawaii (9/28/21)

The White House announcement is here: 

Clare E. Connors, U.S. Attorney nominee for the District of Hawaii

Clare E. Connors has served as the Attorney General of Hawaii since January 2019. Prior to her appointment, Ms. Connors was an attorney at the law firm of Davis Levin Livingston in Honolulu from 2011 to 2018. From 2004 to 2011, Ms. Connors served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Hawaii. Ms. Connors also served as a Trial Attorney in the Tax Division of the United States Department of Justice and as a Special Assistant United States Attorney in the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia from 2003 to 2004. Ms. Connors served as a law clerk for Judge David Alan Ezra on the United States District Court for the District of Hawaii from 2002 to 2003.

Ms. Connors received her J.D. from Harvard Law School in 2002 and her B.A., cum laude, from Yale College in 1996.

Andrew Strelka joins Latham & Watkins LLP (9/9/21)

In a press release here, Latham and Watkins announced that Andrew Strelka joined the firm after a stint in the Biden White House as Senior Tax Counsel.  In part relevant to his Tax Division service, the press release says " Strelka's prior government service also includes experience at the Internal Revenue Service, the US Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, and the US Department of Justice's Tax Division where he was detailed to a similar tax advisory role in the Obama White House."  

His firm bio is here.

Ann Reid Retires from DOJ Tax (9/1/21)

Another over the transom email from the AAG regarding the retirement of Ann Reid:

All – I want to take just a minute of your time to recognize Ann Reid’s retirement on August 30. Following her service as an officer in the U.S. Navy, Ann joined the Tax Division in 1986. She has been a trial attorney, Counsel to a Deputy AAG, Assistant Chief, and most recently Chief of the Division’s Office of Review and Financial Litigation Unit. Ann was outstanding in all these roles, achieving great results for the United States. In addition to her legal accomplishments, Ann has been a force for improving the Division. She was the vice chair in the Division’s Diversity Committee’s first year, and chair in its second year when its by-laws were drafted and adopted. Along the way, Ann showed everyone that the same attorney could be a tough-as-nails litigator who leaves nothing on the table in negotiations, lead the knitting club, create fabulous art, and be at the vanguard of demonstrating how parents can apply themselves to the difficult balance of family and work demands. The American public greatly benefitted from Ann’s dedicated service, and the Division is a better place for it.

Dennis Donohue Retires from DOJ Tax (9/1/21)

Someone threw over my internet transom an email from the AAG announcing the retirement of Dennis Donohue.  Given the subject matter, I did not think anyone would object to my copying and pasting the contents here:

Dennis Donohue is retiring from his role as Chief Senior Litigation Counsel today.

After graduating with a Masters of Tax Law from George Washington University’s National Law Center, Dennis began his career with the Tax Division in 1971. His original intention was to complete his four-year commitment and then leave for private practice. But he quickly developed a passion for representing the United States in complex tax litigation. Beginning with the first wave of abusive shelters in the 1980s, through the corporate abusive shelters of the 1990s, and continuing to the present day, Dennis successfully litigated numerous cases against some of the most formidable tax litigators in the country. Abusive tax shelter schemes such as Corporate Owned Life Insurance (COLI) and Structured Trust Advantaged Repackaged Securities (STARS) were rejected by the courts as a result of Dennis’s dogged advocacy. Dennis’s efforts over the years brought billions of dollars into the Treasury and contributed to the tax law’s development.

As Chief Senior Litigation Counsel, Dennis was called on to develop and supervise teams of trial attorneys and administrative professionals from across the Division. He worked extensively with the Internal Revenue Service, IRS Chief Counsel's Office and, at times, with other Government agencies. Over his career, Dennis worked with top economists, academics, and other expert witnesses from around the world, resulting in courtroom presentations that distilled complex transactions into understandable concepts. While each team differed based on the nature of the case, they had one thing in common— forming to immediately face top tax practitioners in our nation’s most challenging and sophisticated tax cases.

Dennis has been on the forefront of developing new strategies to present complicated, technical cases to judges and juries throughout his career. His innovative techniques and trial tactics have been adopted by other attorneys to enhance their overall presentation of evidence in court. In the mid-1990s, a new breed of dauntingly intricate shelters surfaced, designed by sophisticated tax professionals for corporations and high-net-worth individuals. These cases often generated millions of pages of documents and thousands of exhibits. Dennis responded by becoming one of the pioneers in presenting evidence electronically and leading the Division to the new frontier of electronic court presentation.

UGA Law Names Rotunda for Chester C. Davenport (9/1/21)

The announcement is here.  Some excerpts (bold-face supplied by JAT):

The University of Georgia School of Law has named its iconic rotunda after its first Black graduate, Chester C. Davenport. A portrait of Davenport is being commissioned and will eventually hang in the space located at the main entrance to the law school.

Davenport, who passed away in August 2020, was a monumental figure in the School of Law’s history. He was the law school’s first Black student and remained its only Black student during his law school career. He earned his law degree in 1966, finishing in the top 5% of his class and serving as a founding member of the editorial board of the Georgia Law Review.

* * * * 

During the past year, Davenport was memorialized with the establishment of the Chester C. Davenport Memorial Endowment at the law school and was posthumously awarded the UGA Alumni Association’s oldest and highest honor, the Alumni Merit Award.

* * * *

After law school, the Athens, Georgia, native and Morehouse College graduate became an attorney in the tax division of the U.S. Department of Justice and subsequently served as a legislative assistant for California Sen. Alan Cranston. Following a position on President Jimmy Carter’s transition team and an appointment as assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Transportation, Davenport co-founded a law practice based in Washington, D.C. He later started a private equity firm.