Three attorneys join Conner & Winters

Journal Record, The (Oklahoma City), Apr 26, 2001

Three attorneys have joined the Oklahoma City office of Conner & Winters.

Jared D. Giddens and Bryan J. Wells joined the firm as shareholders and John E. Gatliff is an associate.

Giddens will practice primarily in commercial litigation, business reorganization and bankruptcy and commercial transactions. He is a graduate of the University of Central Oklahoma and received his law degree from the University of Oklahoma.

Wells will practice in commercial litigation and bankruptcy. He is a graduate of OU and received his law degree from OU

Gatliff will practice in litigation and bankruptcy. He received his undergraduate and law degrees from OU and a master's degree in religious education from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Ronald C. Potter has joined the Tulsa office of Conner & Winters as a shareholders. He will practice in international business transactions, general corporate and securities law. He received his law degree from OU.

Katherine G. Coyle, Melodie Freeman-Burney, Beverly K. Smith and Rebecca S. Woodward have been promoted to shareholders in the Tulsa office.

Conner & Winters, founded in 1932, has 70 attorneys in office in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and northwest Arkansas.

Givens named to panel

Keith F. Givens, an attorney with McKinney & Stringer in Oklahoma City, has been added to the Mediation Panel for the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma.

Questions for lawyers

Oklahoma attorneys will offer free legal advice on Tuesday as part of the nationwide Law Day celebration. State residents can call a toll-free hotline to talk with an attorney or watch the Ask A Lawyer television show at 7 p.m. Tuesday on OETA.

The Oklahoma City area hotline -- (800) 456-8525 -- will be staffed by local attorneys from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. The project is sponsored by the Oklahoma Bar Association and county bar associations across the state. J. William Conger, Oklahoma County Bar Association president, named Judge Valerie J. Couch as Law Day chairperson.

Topics for the Ask A Lawyer television program will be abortion, Internet fraud and protecting the best interests of children. Oklahoma County District Judge Niles Jackson will be the moderator and Rep. Ray L. Vaughn Jr., R-Edmond and an attorney, will be the host. Rudolph Hargrave, chief justice of the Oklahoma Supreme Court, Charles "Buddy" Neal, OBA president, and Bill Sullivan, OBA executive director, also will participate in the television show.

Addressing grads

Drew Edmondson, attorney general of Oklahoma, will deliver the commencement address at Connors State College, Warner, at 10:30 a.m. May 12.

College violations

There have been 1,357 liquor law violations in the past three years at Oklahoma State University and the University of Oklahoma, but fewer than one-third are listed on the schools' Web sites.

The discrepancy stems from the fact schools are not required under a new crime reporting law to disclose DUIs, public intoxication or transporting an open container as liquor offenses, said U.S. Department of Education spokeswoman Jane Glickman.

S. Daniel Carter, senior vice president of Pennsylvania-based Security on Campus Inc., said the statistical disparity "is one of the unintended consequences of the new law."

"It uses language from the 1930s. We're asking Congress to consider fixing it," he told the Tulsa World.

Security on Campus Inc. is a nonprofit watchdog group dedicated to accurate reporting of campus crime and to openness by campus police departments.

The group has championed the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act, formerly the Campus Security Act of 1990. The modified law requires 6,700 colleges and universities across the nation to post annual crime statistics and daily police logs in a public forum.

Public and private schools are using Web sites or informational pamphlets to satisfy the rule.

Racial profiling

Most minorities in Oklahoma believe racial profiling is a serious problem in the state, a new survey shows.

The latest Oklahoma Poll sponsored by the Tulsa World says blacks, Indians and Hispanics believe police consider a person's race or ethnicity when detaining suspects or making traffic stops.

Forty-two percent of the 750 people who participated in the statewide survey said they believe racial profiling is widespread in Oklahoma. Forty-one percent said it was not and 17 percent offered no opinion.

But the results from minority respondents were much different than the overall results.

More than 80 percent of blacks, 66 percent of American Indians and 50 percent of Hispanics said racial profiling is a serious problem in Oklahoma, said poll consultant Al Soltow.

Residents in Oklahoma City and Tulsa were more inclined to say serious racial profiling exists than people living outside the metropolitan areas. In Oklahoma City, 46 percent said racial profiling is widespread. It was 44 percent in Tulsa.

Class action

Dreier Baritz & Federman of Oklahoma City has filed three class- action lawsuits.

A lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California against BroadVision Inc.