Carolina Law Welcomes Six New Faculty Members and Names New Chair Appointments

UNC School of Law is pleased to welcome six new full-time faculty members this semester. The new faculty include:

Kevin Bennardo
Clinical Associate Professor of Law (RRWA/WLRC)
Kevin Bennardo teaches Research, Reasoning, Writing and Advocacy at UNC School of Law. Before his appointment at UNC, he held faculty positions at the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law, the Louisiana State University Paul M. Hebert Law Center, and the University of Richmond School of Law. He has taught courses in the areas of legal analysis, research, and communication, criminal sentencing, and trusts & estates. In 2016, the students at IU-McKinney Law voted Bennardo the recipient of the Red Cane Award. The award is presented to the most outstanding professor who has been with the law school for three or fewer years. Bennardo’s scholarship has been cited in case books, treatises, and judicial opinions of federal courts of appeals, state supreme courts, and lower courts. In 2016, he received an LWI-ALWD-LexisNexis Scholarship Grant for his ongoing work on precedent. He regularly presents his research at conferences and also serves as an assistant editor for Legal Writing: The Journal of the Legal Writing Institute. Before his academic career, Bennardo worked as a staff attorney for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, as court counsel for the Supreme Court of the Republic of Palau, and as a law clerk to the Honorable Milton I. Shadur of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. He also practiced intellectual property litigation with the firm of Sidley Austin LLP in Chicago. During law school, he served as executive editor of the Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law.

Kate Elengold
Clinical Associate Professor of Law (Consumer Financial Transactions Clinic)
Kate Elengold is a clinical associate professor of law and director of the Consumer Financial Transactions Clinic. Her research interests lie at the intersection of race, gender and poverty. Her most recent scholarship focuses on issues related to racialized sexual harassment in housing. Prior to joining the Carolina Law faculty, Elengold taught the Women and the Law Clinic and Legal Ethics at American University Washington College of Law. Before transitioning to academia, Elengold was a trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice. She litigated cases under the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Housing and Community Development Act. She acted as lead counsel on several pattern or practice cases, including complex litigation resulting in a year-long federal district court bench trial. Elengold also clerked in the Northern District of Illinois for the Honorable James B. Moran. She graduated from New York University School of Law, where she was a student article development editor on the NYU Review of Law and Social Change, and received her undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan.

Andy Hessick teaches Evidence, Federal Jurisdiction and Remedies, and his research interests include federal courts, administrative law, remedies and criminal sentencing. Prior to joining the faculty at UNC School of Law, Hessick was a professor at the University of Utah and Arizona State University and was a visiting assistant professor at Boston University. Before beginning teaching, he served as a Bristow Fellow in the U.S. Solicitor General’s office and practiced litigation at Kellogg Huber Hansen Todd Evans & Figel PLLC in Washington, D.C. He also clerked for Judge Reena Raggi on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and Judge A. Raymond Randolph on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. His work has appeared in the California Law Review, the Cornell Law Review, the Northwestern University Law Review, the Notre Dame Law Review, and the William and Mary Law Review. His work has been cited by the Supreme Courts of Connecticut, Iowa, Missouri, Tennessee, and Utah; various federal district courts; the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Second, Third, Sixth, and Eleventh circuits; and the U.S. Supreme Court. Hessick received his J.D. from Yale Law School, at which he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. He received his B.A. in mathematics and classical archaeology from Dartmouth.

Hessick teaches Criminal Law, Professional Responsibility, and Current Topics in Criminal Justice. Before joining the faculty at Carolina Law, Hessick taught on the faculties at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law and the University of Utah’s S.J. Quinney College of Law. She also spent two years as a Climenko Fellow at Harvard Law School. While at Arizona State, Hessick won the Outstanding Teacher Award, which is awarded based on a vote of the graduating class. After graduating from law school, she clerked for Judge Barbara S. Jones on the Southern District of New York and for Judge A. Raymond Randolph on the D.C. Circuit. She also worked as a litigation associate at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz in New York City. Hessick received her undergraduate degree from Columbia University and her J.D. from Yale Law School, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal and winner of the Potter Stewart Prize for the Morris Tyler Moot Court of Appeals.

Eisha Jain teaches Criminal Law and Criminal Law as Civil Regulation. Her research focuses on the blurring boundaries between civil and criminal law. Her most recent publications are Arrests as Regulation, published by the Stanford Law Review and Prosecuting Collateral Consequences, published by the Georgetown Law Journal. Jain previously practiced for several years as a criminal defense and civil rights lawyer. She also previously clerked on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Jain joins Carolina Law from Georgetown University Law Center, where she held a law research fellowship. She earned her J.D. from Yale Law School, where she was awarded the Michael Egger Prize for the best student note published in the Yale Law Journal on a current social problem.

Jonas Monast is the inaugural C. Boyden Gray Distinguished Fellow at Carolina Law and co-directs the Center on Climate, Energy, Environment & Economics (CE3). He teaches Energy Law and Natural Resources Law. Monast’s work focuses on the interaction of federal and state energy policies, aligning energy and environmental policy goals, and regulatory options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Prior to joining the Carolina Law faculty, he directed the Climate and Energy Program at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions and taught courses on energy and environmental issues at Duke University’s School of Law and Nicholas School of the Environment. Monast has also worked as an attorney in the Corporate Social Responsibility Practice at Foley Hoag LLP, as a congressional fellow for the late Senator Paul Wellstone, and as legislative counsel for the Center for Responsible Lending. Monast earned his law degree from Georgetown University and his B.A. from Appalachian State University.

In addition to the new faculty members, UNC School of Law also recently named the following new chair appointments:

• Patricia L. Bryan , Henry P. Brandis Distinguished Professor of Law
• Maxine Eichner , Graham Kenan Distinguished Professor of Law
• Holning Lau , Reef C. Ivey, II Distinguished Professor of Law

-August 24, 2016