Irish America magazine - Oct/Nov '08 issue: The Legacy of the San Patricios Lives On , Stars of the South, The Legal 100, Roots: The Mighty Mahers, All Hail The Humble Spud! , Music: Still Fiddlin’ Away , The Real Bill , The Battle over Ulysses, Broadway's Irish Colleen

Irish America is proud to present its inaugural Legal 100 feature. The following list is comprised of lawyers from all around the country who share a passion for the law and pride in their heritage.

A-De | Do-Ho | Hy-N | O-W

Colleen Ann Hyland is an Associate Judge of the Chicago Circuit Court. She received her B.A. from John Carroll University. A graduate of DePaul Law School, Colleen spent her early career as an assistant for the Illinois State’s Attorney’s Office, and made a name for herself as an assistant prosecutor in the sexual misconduct case against Congressman Mel Reynolds. She went on to serve as a judge in the Chicago criminal courts where she heard several high-profile gang cases. She was recently relocated to the District 5 Municipal Courts.

Hyland grew up in Evergreen Park, a predominantly Irish Catholic neighborhood in the south suburbs of Chicago. Her father, John Hyland, was the president of Evergreen Savings and Loan and the son of Irish immigrants from Castlebar, County Mayo. Her mother Mary’s grandparents came from Tipperary.

Hyland is an Alumni Fellow of Leadership Greater Chicago and teaches trial advocacy at Depaul Law School. She lives in the Chicago suburbs with her husband, John, and their daughter, Maggie.

Hugh Keefe, a Managing Partner at the Connecticut law firm Lynch, Traub, Keefe & Errante PC, was the first U.S. lawyer to be board-certified in both civil and criminal trial advocacy. He has taught trial advocacy at the Yale Law School since 1978, is an Associate Fellow of Saybrook College, and continues to try both civil and criminal cases in federal and state courts.

Keefe, who graduated from Quinnipiac University and the University of Connecticut Law School, has consistently been listed as one of the best lawyers in America in various publications. He has been honored with the Distinguished Alumnus Award from both the University of Connecticut Law School and Quinnipiac University, and he and his three sons carry the Quinnipiac University banner at the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade each year.

Both of Keefe's parents were born in County Kerry, his mother in Kenmare and his father on Castleisland. He is a member of the Gaelic Club in East Haven, Connecticut, and his firm sponsors “Sounds of Ireland,” a weekly radio show that airs in the New Haven area.

Kevin M. Kearney is a partner in the Brooklyn law firm of Wingate, Kearney & Cullen, which for over 100 years has represented religious and not-for-profit organizations.

A native of Brooklyn, New York, Kearney is a director of Mutual of America Investment Corporation and serves as chairman of its Audit Committee. He is also a director of Concern Worldwide U.S, and has traveled extensively with Concern to the neediest countries.

Kearney, who holds degrees in philosophy from Manhattan College, and a Doctor of Law from St. John’s University School of Law, has lectured at Fordham University Center for Non Public Education. He has served on the New York State Interfaith Commission on Landmarking of Religious Properties and the New York State Council of Catholic Bishops Legal Advisory Commission.

An avid runner who has completed 12 marathons, Kearney resides in Belle Harbor, New York with his wife, Mary Beth, a Clinical Nurse Specialist in Pediatric Cardiology at Schneider’s Children’s Hospital, New Hyde Park, New York, and their children, Christine, Elisa and Sean.

Paul M. Kane, a partner in the Boston law firm of McGrath & Kane, specializes in Family Law. He is a former Assistant Dean of Boston College Law School and has been a Family Law lecturer at Boston College since 1970. He has lectured on numerous aspects of Family Law practice for Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education, the Massachusetts Bar Association, the Flaschner Institute, the Massachusetts Inns of Court and Suffolk University Law School’s Advanced Legal Studies program.

Kane is a member of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers and has been listed in The Best Lawyers in America since 1989. He is a graduate of Boston College and Boston College Law School, and currently serves as a member of the Board of Overseers at the school.

Kane, who served in the United States Navy from 1964-1967, is also an adjunct professor at Suffolk University Law School. He is first-generation Irish-American whose mother is from County Cork and whose father is from the Aran Islands.

At the age of 34, Don Keenan was the youngest lawyer ever inducted into the Inner Circle of Advocates, and has received numerous honors, including the Chief Justice Award for Civility and Professionalism (the highest honor possible for a lawyer in Georgia). He was also named one of the best medical negligence lawyers in the United States by the National Law Journal.

In 1993, Keenan formed the Keenan’s Kids Foundation to help children at risk in the legal system. He is also the driving force behind fundraising efforts to provide a new home for the Murphy family of Atlanta, who have adopted 23 children with special needs.

Raised in Morehead City, North Carolina, Keenan knew from an early age that good things do not come easily to all. He was raised by his grandfather, who told him stories of his Irish ancestors and the “No Irish Need Apply” signs they encountered.

Today, Keenan is the driving force behind Irish America magazine’s annual “Stars of the South” gala in Atlanta, which honors Irish-Americans from the Southern U.S.

Anastasia D. Kelly is the American International Group’s (AIG) executive vice president, general counsel, and senior regulatory and compliance officer. She supervises 550 and lawyers around the world. Between 2003 and 2006, Kelly served as Executive Vice President and General Counsel of MCI during its bankruptcy proceedings. She also worked for Sears, Roebuck and Co., and Fannie Mae.

Kelly received her B.A. from Trinity College, Washington, and her J.D. from George Washington University Law Center. She has been involved with a significant amount of non-profit and committee work throughout her career. She was born and raised in Boston, the daughter of an Irish Catholic policeman who “instilled in her the love of the law and maybe a bit of the Blarney, too,” and was encouraged by both parents to get the highest level of education possible.

Her family on her father’s side is from County Meath, where her cousins still live, and her mother’s side hails from County Cork. She and her husband Tom are the very proud parents of twin boys, who just graduated from high school and are off to college (UVA and Davidson).

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy was born in Sacramento, California, on July 23, 1936, the second of his parents’ three children. His father was a well-established attorney and lobbyist and his mother, Gladys McLeod, was involved in civic activities.

An honor student in high school, Kennedy went on to Stanford University. He also spent a year at the London School of Economics. After Stanford, he enrolled in Harvard Law School and graduated cum laude.Kennedy returned to California after law school and practiced in San Francisco. When his father died in 1963, he returned to Sacramento to take over his practice. During this time he befriended Ed Meese. In 1973, Meese, who was working for California governor Ronald Reagan, recruited Kennedy to help draft a plan to limit the state’s spending. Reagan recommended Kennedy for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and in 1975 Kennedy became the youngest federal judge of the day. He was appointed to the Supreme Court, the third Catholic to serve on the nation’s highest bench, by President Reagan, and assumed that office on February 18, 1988.

Kennedy is married to Mary Davis and the couple has three children.

Edmund Lynch serves as a senior litigation attorney at the New Jersey law firm of Lynch and Lynch, where he has worked since 1974. His professional activities are various, ranging from serving as a judge in college and high school mock trials to serving needy defendants as a pro bono attorney.

Lynch received his bachelor’s degree from St. Francis College in 1963 and his law degree from Georgetown University in 1968. Lynch returned to Georgetown in 2005 to moderate a forum on the Irish peace process. He also moderated Syracuse Law School’s forum of the same name and has spoken elsewhere on human rights in Northern Ireland.

Lynch is a second-generation Irish-American whose mother's family hailed from Belfast and his father's family from County Cork. He is married and has three children and a granddaughter. Lynch is active in the Irish community and has received recognition from the Voice of the Innocent Human Rights Project in Belfast and the Peace and Justice Award from Irish Organizations United.

Judge James Murray Lynn is a member of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas of Pennsylvania. Previously, he was a prosecutor and trial lawyer.

He graduated from Loyola University Law School in New Orleans, where he earned the highest average in constitutional law and criminal law and procedure, and was a member of the Loyola Law Review. He returned to New Orleans to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and also assisted in the 9/11 rescue efforts, saying he was inspired by his mother, a nurse who served police and firefighters in Philadelphia.

Lynn, whose ancestors hail from various areas of Ireland including Louth, Down, Donegal and Sligo, has served as president of Philadelphia’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade and is its long-time announcer. He was president and a founding member of the Brehon Law Society, and was invited by President Clinton to serve as a delegate to the White House Conference for Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland and the Border Counties. Judge Lynn is married to Barbara. His 19-year-old daughter, Grainne, is a student at The Catholic University of America.

Thomas Mahoney, Jr., is a partner in the Savannah law firm Ranitz, Mahoney & Mahoney PC, which focuses on criminal and trial law. Mahoney has been involved with general law practice since 1962. He previously served as a Special Agent for the FBI, earned his B.A. from the University of South Carolina and received his J.D. from the University of South Carolina School of Law.

In 1995, Mahoney was elected Grand Marshal of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Savannah, and has served as the past president of both the Irish Heritage and the Sinn Féin Societies of Savannah, the latter of which has no affiliation with Northern Ireland.

A fourth-generation Irish-American who traces his roots to County Cork, Mahoney has traveled to Ireland four times since 2004. He enjoys the sounds of local Savannah musician Harry O’Donoghue, as well as the writings of Frank McCourt, and lives with his wife,

Judy, in Savannah. They are proud parents to four children and grandparents to three.

Seamus McCaffrey is a Justice on the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. McCaffrey became a municipal judge in 1993 and in 2001 was appointed by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court as the Administrative Judge of the Municipal Court. He was elected to the Supreme Court in 2003.

Unlike most in his field, McCaffrey did not earn his law degree until he was almost forty, when he graduated with a J.D. from Temple University School of Law. Born in Belfast, he joined the Marine Corps after graduating Cardinal Dougherty High School in Philadelphia, and later transferred to the Marine Air Force Reserve, where he rose to the rank of Colonel.

McCaffrey, who served on the Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Unit for 20 years, has a reputation that is synonymous with his innovative National Football League Court (he created the ad hoc Nuisance Night Court program in 1998 to deal with rowdy fans at the Philadelphia Eagles home games). He was named “Philadelphia’s Quality of Life Judge” by the city’s largest newspaper. He is married to Lise Rapaport, and they have three sons.

Denis J. McInerney is a former federal prosecutor who concentrates in white collar criminal defense work at Davis Polk & Wardwell where he has been a partner since 1997. He was educated by the Irish Christian Brothers at Iona Grammar School and Iona Prep and received his B.A. from Columbia College and his J.D. from Fordham Law School. He currently serves on the Board of Sanctuary for Families and is a member of the New York City Bar Association’s Committee on Professional and Judicial Ethics.

Denis’ maternal grandfather was Francis T. Murphy, a lawyer and former President of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, whose Irish ancestors came to this country in 1847 and fought in the Civil War. Denis’ paternal grandparents were both born in Clare and came to this country as teenagers. Although they had lived only a few miles apart in Ireland, they first met each other in the Bronx at the Clare Ball. Through several trips to Ireland, Denis’ father instilled in all of his children a love for their heritage which has resulted in their being in regular contact with their aunts, uncles and cousins from O’Callaghan’s Mills, Loch Graney and Dublin.

Rob McKenna is Washington’s 17th Attorney General. As the state’s chief legal officer, he directs 500 attorneys and over 700 professional staff providing legal services to state agencies, boards and commissions.

McKenna, whose great-grandfather immigrated from Buncrana, County Donegal in the late 1860s, received his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1988, where he was a member of the Law Review. He earned a B.A. in economics and a B.A. in international studies, both with honors, from the University of Washington. A committed community leader, he has raised funds for Seattle’s Eastside Domestic Violence Program and the Bellevue Schools Foundation. A former Eagle Scout, he also serves as a board member with the Chief Seattle Council of the Boy Scouts of America, is on the board of the Bellevue Community College Foundation and is a longtime member of the Bellevue Rotary, as well as serving as a fundraising chair of the Eastside Domestic Violence Program.

McKenna and his wife of 20 years, Marilyn, have four children.

Judge Joseph M. McLaughlin was appointed United States Circuit Judge on October 17, 1990 and entered on duty the next day. He received his LL.B. from Fordham Law School, and his LLM from New York University Law School, and served in the United States Army from 1955-57.

Judge McLaughlin served as dean of Fordham Law School from 1971 to 1981, and was chairman of the New York State Law Revision Commission from 1975 to 1982. He was a United States District Judge from the Eastern District of New York from 1981 to 1990, and also an Adjunct Professor at St. John’s Law School from 1982 to 1997.

A first-generation Irish-American whose father’s and mother’s families both hail from County Longford, Judge McLaughlin is married to the former Frances Lynch and has four children, Mary Jo, Joseph, Matthew and Andrew.

Only three people have given the address at the annual Friendly Sons of St. Patrick New York dinner more than once: William Hughes Mulligan, Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen and Judge Joseph M. McLaughlin.

Paul J. McNamara, partner at Masterman, Culbert and Tully LLP, is a member of the bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. He is a 1965 graduate of Boston College Law School and received its 1989 Alumnus of the Year Award. McNamara specializes in property and estate planning. He also represents individuals in estate planning, probate administration, and tax and succession planning. He serves on the Board of Overseers of Boston College Law School and the Board of Trustees of the Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Boston, and has served on the Board of Directors of the Irish Immigration Center.

McNamara’s paternal grandmother, Mary Swift McNamara, came from Williamstown, Co. Galway in the late 1800s and married Bernard F. McNamara of Boston. His mother’s family, the Cassidys, immigrated in the 1800s from Dublin. McNamara is married to Mary Hallisey who traces her roots to Tubercurry, Co. Sligo. They have two sons, Paul Joseph McNamara, Jr. and Bernard Swift McNamara, and three grandchildren, Nina, Alice, and Callum.

John P. McNicholas III is a senior partner at the Los Angeles law firm of McNicholas and McNicholas. Recent court victories included a $5.4 million settlement on behalf of the Isley Brothers against Sony Music and singer Michael Bolton. He also won a $1.67 million settlement for a single mother who sustained serious injury from an over-the-counter dietary supplement.

McNicholas received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Los Angeles and his law degree from Loyola Law School. He received Loyola’s Board of Governors Award in 2000 and has served on the advisory board to UCLA’s Catholic Center since 2000.

McNicholas is a third-generation Irish-American whose father’s family hails from County Mayo and whose mother, Rosemary’s, from Cork. He is a member of the Society of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick’s Executive Board and the Irish American Bar Association, which awarded him the Daniel O’Connell Award in 2005. McNicholas is married and has seven children.

John J. Meehan is a retired District Attorney in California’s Alameda County.

He began working in the state District Attorney’s office in 1960, having graduated from the University of San Francisco, School of Law. He had been inspired by his father who was a police captain, active in the predominantly Irish community of Eureka Valley near San Francisco, to pursue a career in prosecution.

Meehan, who was named the St. Thomas More Lawyer of the Year in 2003, also has a talent for the written word, starting a publication called Point Of View, which reviewed cases from the United States Supreme Court and the California courts. He continues to write a column for a statewide legal publication called Did You Know.

Meehan’s paternal grandparents hailed from County Leitrim and his mother’s family was from County Cork. He and his wife, who is part Irish-American, had four children, three living, and spent their thirtieth wedding anniversary in Ireland.

Former senator George J. Mitchell has a name that is synonymous with the Northern Irish peace process, having chaired the talks which led to the Good Friday Agreement. A partner in the New York City law firm DLA Piper, Mitchell served as a U.S. senator from Maine for fifteen years and was voted the “most respected member” for six consecutive years. He served as Senate Majority Leader and was instrumental in the reauthorization of the Clean Air Act and Americans with Disabilities Act. He served as Chairman of the International Commission on Disarmament in Northern Ireland, for which he received the Nobel Peace Prize and Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Mitchell also served as Chairman of the International Crisis Group, and has been appointed Chancellor of the Queen’s University in Northern Ireland. He recently headed an investigation into past steroid use in major league baseball.

A Maine native, Mitchell received his bachelor’s degree from Bowdoin College and his law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center. He is a second-generation Irish-American.

Patrick Meehan, who until recently served as United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, first began his public service work in 1995 when appointed District Attorney of Delaware County, Pennsylvania. As U.S. Attorney, Patrick pioneered the Anti-Terrorism Task Force, which has since been touted as a national model for the prevention of future terrorist attacks. His most recent accomplishment, the “Route 222 Corridor Anti-Gang Initiative,” brings together faith-based and community efforts with local, state and federal law enforcement to establish safer neighborhood conditions across five cities and four counties in Pennsylvania.

On July 21, 2008, Meehan joined Conrad O’Brien Gellman & Rohn, P.C. where his focus will be on representing multi-national corporations and individuals and a wide range of corporate commercial litigation.

Meehan graduated from Bowdoin College in Maine and earned his J.D. from Temple University. A Philadelphia native, he is a third-generation Irish-American with roots in County Mayo and enjoys the sounds of the contemporary Irish band the Corrs. He is married with three children.

As Partner and Co-head of Corporate Restructuring at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom, LLP, Greg Milmoe plays a leadership role in the Los Angeles firm’s numerous restructurings, acquisitions and financings. His career with Skadden began before he even graduated law school, as a mailroom assistant in 1971.

A graduate of Fordham University Law School, Milmoe received his A.B. from Cornell University. As a corporate lawyer, Milmoe has received accolades for his ability to fashion pragmatic solutions to complex problems from differing legal disciplines. In 2007, The American Lawyer awarded Milmoe its Dealmaker of the Year award, and he has also been named to Turnarounds and Workouts’s list of the top dozen restructuring lawyers in America.

Milmoe’s achievements aren’t limited to law: in 2006 he was honored by the Partnership for Afterschool Education as its Afterschool Champion, and in 2008 he helped win the Lawyer’s Cup for Skadden’s ice hockey team.

Milmoe’s father’s family hail from Sligo, while his mother’s come from Galway. He is married with two children.

Justice Donald Molloy worked in private practice, where he focused on civil litigation, before he was appointed U.S. District Judge for the District of Montana, Missoula Division in 1996. With jurisdiction over a vast amount of federal land, including ten national forests, Molloy has been colored as “one of the greenest judges in the West” by High Country News, a magazine dedicated to reporting environmental news in the West.

Judge Molloy graduated with a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Montana, and received his J.D. from the university’s Law School after serving five years active duty in the U.S. Navy. His Irish ancestors emigrated from Counties Offaly and Cork to Montana. Of his sense of Irish connection in America, Donald says, “Being Irish is being part of a very large clan that tends to take care of its members socially, spiritually and in their essence.” Judge Molloy instituted an internship program under which law students at University College Cork have the opportunity to attend the University of Montana.

He has been married to Judith for 37 years and they have five children.

A lawyer at Lewis, Owens and Mulherin, a firm concentrating on personal injury cases, Joseph Mulherin previously practiced law at Bouhan, Williams and Levy for sixteen years, where he focused on civil litigation. A member of the Savannah and American Bar Associations and the American Association for Justice, Mulherin focuses on automobile collision, medical misconduct and workplace injury cases.

Mulherin graduated from the University of Georgia and went on to earn his J.D. from the university’s Law School. A fourth-generation Irish-American with roots in County Mayo, he believes that being Irish means “sharing a sense of pride with others in the many accomplishments of the Irish and enjoying a camaraderie with other Irish people resulting from the many hardships our people have overcome.”

An active participant in the Ancient Order of Hibernians’s annual Irish road bowling competition, Mulherin enjoys the tunes of both the Clancy Brothers and The Chieftains. He lives in Georgia and is married with a son and a daughter.

Kenneth P. Nolan, managing partner of the New York office of Speiser, Krause, Nolan & Granito, specializes in aviation personal injury and wrongful death litigation and trials. He has successfully obtained million-dollar verdicts and settlements in the Avianca crash on September 20, 1989 and the TWA Flight 800 explosion of July 17, 1996, as well as many others.

Nolan has served as an editor for The New York Times and has written articles for The Times and other publications. He is a past member of the Board of Editors of The New York State Bar Journal and has been president of the Catholic Lawyers Guild.

A past president of the Emerald Association of Long Island and a past member of the Board of Trustees of Bishop Ford Central Catholic High School, Nolan has been honored by the Holy Name Foundation, which raises funds to support Nolan’s former grammar school.

Nolan’s family is from Tipperary and Limerick. He and his wife Nancy have four children and live in Brooklyn and Shelter Island, New York.

Thomas J. Nolan is a partner in the Los Angeles law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom LLP and the co-chair of Skadden’s West Coast litigation practice. He has extensive experience representing corporations and individuals in civil and criminal litigation. A former federal prosecutor, he served as chief of fraud and prosecutions in the Los Angeles U.S. Attorney’s office.

Nolan is consistently recognized for his work by California’s Daily Journal and Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business, and was selected by The Best Lawyers in America for its 2008 edition. In addition to his extensive white-collar defense practice, Nolan has represented clients in complex civil litigation matters and has obtained verdicts of over one billion dollars for his clients over the past six years. Nolan is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a fellow of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers

Nolan received both his undergraduate and law degrees from Loyola University. His mother's family hails from County Mayo. He is married and lives in California.