Head of School

Val Corbett BCL, LLM (NUI), Pg Cert.

Val Corbett graduated with BCL and LL.M degrees from University College Cork. He is currently a Phd candidate with the Law School at Trinity College Dublin. In 2008, he completed a postgraduate certificate in third level learning and teaching at Dublin Institute of Technology. Having formerly worked in the legal department in KPMG, Val was head of the undergraduate law school at Griffith College for seven years. He is an elected council member of the Irish Association of Law Teachers (IALT) and has been acted as an external examiner for Athlone Institute of Technology and the Institute of Technology Tallaght. Val may be contacted at val.corbett@independentcolleges.ie

Teaching Interests

• The Law of Torts – LLB, FE1 and King’s Inns
• Employment Law – LLB
• Law of Privacy – LLM
• Law of Contract – FE1

Research Interests

• Law of Torts
• Law of Privacy
• Employment Law

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Lecturers

Tomas  Clancy, MA, BA (Mod) Hons in Legal Science, Barrister-at-Law

 

 

 

Tomás Clancy is an immensely popular lecturer who has previously lectured in law in Trinity College Dublin, the Institute of Public Administration and, more recently, Portobello College. Tomás will lecture in Property law and Jurisprudence on Independent Colleges’ LL.B (Hons) programme, and will be Year Head of final year LL.B students. He will act as Programme Leader on the College’s proposed LLM in Comparative Media Law.

Dr. Maura Kelly, BCL; PDA; M.Phil.; PhD.

 

 

 

 

Maura Kelly graduated from University College, Dublin in 1987 with a Bachelor of Civil Law, Honours degree. She worked for four years as a taxation consultant with Price Waterhouse Coopers. In 1992 she joined Portobello College where she helped establish the first private law school in Ireland. From 1992 to 2000, she held the position of Head of Law School and senior lecturer in Constitutional law at Portobello College. In 1998, Maura was awarded a Masters in Philosophy in law from the University of Wales, Cardiff Law School. The thesis involved a comparative review of the succession rights of a surviving spouse and children.

From 2003 to 2007, while pursuing a Doctorate in Philosophy in law, Maura held the position of senior tutor in Constitutional Law on the Bachelor of Civil Law and Bachelor of Business and Legal Studies programmes at University College, Dublin. Her doctoral thesis involved a comparative study of private property rights under the Irish and United States Constitutions.

Since 2007, Maura holds the position of senior lecturer in Constitutional law and EU law at Independent College Dublin on its LL.B programme. Maura also acts as legal writing and research assistant to students on the LLB programme.

Ciarán Patton, LL.B (Ling. Germ.), Barrister-at-Law

From 1993 until 1997, Ciarán Patton studied Law and German at Trinity College Dublin and the Georgia-Augusta University, Goettingen, Germany. He graduated, highest in class, in 1997. Between 1997 and 1999, he studied Law at the Honorable Society of King’s Inns, Dublin. During this time, Ciarán was also employed by Arthur Cox, Solicitors, on major litigation. Having qualified as a Barrister-at-Law in 1999, he went on to represent clients in litigation as diverse as Chancery, Commercial, Criminal and Family. In 2002 and 2003, he worked on the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, which, at that time, was chaired by the Honorable Ms. Justice Laffoy, judge of the High Court.

Having been lecturing law since 1999, Ciarán has accumulated a wealth of teaching experience. Between 1999 and 2008, he taught the Criminal Law and Equity and the Law of Trusts at Griffith College Dublin. Since 2005, he has been teaching the Criminal Law at the Honorable Society of King’s Inns. Since 2008, he has been teaching the Criminal Law, Equity and the Law of Trusts and the Law of Evidence on Independent College Dublin’s (ICD) undergraduate and professional-law (FE 1 and King’s Inns) programmes.

Ciarán is the author of the texts used on Independent College Dublin’s professional-law courses in the Criminal Law, Equity and the Law of Trusts and the Law of Evidence. He is currently writing Principles of Irish Criminal Law for Clarus Press, which is due for publication in 2012.

Ciarán can be contacted at ciaran.patton@independentcolleges.ie

Teaching Interests

- The Criminal Law

- Equity and the Law of Trusts

- The Law of Evidence

Research Interests

- The Criminal Law

Estelle Feldman, MA (D.U); MBA; (N.U.I), LL.B; (Wales); DCG(N.U.I.).

 

 

 

 

Estelle Feldman is a Research Associate in the School of Law, Trinity College since 1996. She is a contributing editor to Freedom of Information Law and Practice (Firstlaw, Dublin 2006); co-author Access to Information in Developing Countries, (Transparency International, Berlin, 1998). Estelle also contributes to the Annual Review of Irish Law on Information Law and the Ombudsman, Whistleblower Protection, and co-authors the chapter on Constitutional Law with Dr. Oran Doyle. She has published widely on judicial independence, whistleblower protection, freedom of information, public service accountability and children’s rights in healthcare. Estelle teaches Administrative Law and Constitutional Law on the College’s LL.B degree programme.

Nicola White LL.B, LL.M (Dub), Attorney at Law (New York), Mediator

 

 

 

Nicola White is regarded as a national and international expert in the area of dispute resolution.

She is the legal expert for the Law Reform Commission’s project on Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR). She was the principal legal researcher for the Commission’s Consultation Paper on ADR which was published in 2008. She is currently working on the Commission’s Final Report on ADR.

In 2010, Nicola was selected as a Weinstein International Fellow in Dispute Resolution by JAMS – which is the largest private ADR provider in the world. As part of her fellowship, she spent a number of months working in California in JAMS with some of the world’s leading academics and practitioners in the field of dispute resolution. She also spent time researching at the Gould Center for Negotiation and Mediation at Stanford University Law School.

Nicola is the Course Director and lecturer on the Diploma in Mediation programme at Independent Colleges. She has also spoken at a number of conferences, both in Ireland and internationally, on the area of dispute resolution.

Siobhán Cummiskey LL.B. (Dub.), LL.M. (Human Rights Law) (Nottingham), Attorney-at-Law (New York), Solicitor

 

 

 

Siobhán is a practising solicitor and a member of the bar in the State of New York. Siobhán holds a LL.B from the University of Dublin, Trinity College and spent a Socrates year at Universiteit Leiden. Siobhán graduated first in her class with a LL.M. in Human Rights Law from the University of Nottingham and has worked with human rights organisations in the UK, India, Africa and Ireland. She is a regular contributor to the Irish Human Rights Law Review (Clarus Press) and is the equality expert on the board of directors of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. Siobhán has been lecturing on FE1 preparatory courses since 2005, and currently teaches Constitutional Law on the FE1 preparatory course.”

Michelle Quinn, LL.B; LL.M (Trinity College Dublin).

Michelle Quinn graduated with an LL.B degree from Nottingham Trent University and an LL.M from Trinity College Dublin. Michelle is a trainee solicitor with Malcomson Law Solicitors. She is an accredited Civil & Commercial Mediator (Friary Law & ADR Group (UK). She holds memberships with the Mediators’ Institute of Ireland (MII) and the Irish Commercial Mediation Association (ICMA). She was a Senior Tutor with the Law Faculty at University College Dublin in the Law of Torts, Company Law, Land Law and European Union Law. Michelle teaches on the College’s Employment Law Diploma.

Justine Quinn, LL.B (Dub), LL.M (LSE), Attorney-at-Law (New York), Barrister-at-Law

 

 

 

 

Justine Quinn was a 1999 Entrance Exhibition Scholar at Trinity College from where she graduated in 2003 with a Bachelor of Laws. She qualified as an Attorney and Counsellor-at-Law in 2004 and has been called to the Bar of New York. She was called to the Bar of Ireland in 2005 and later completed a Masters in Laws at the London School of Economics. She is Course Director of the College’s New York Bar programme and is also teaches on the programme.

Imelda Kelly, BBLS, Attorney-at-Law (New York), Barrister-at-Law

 

 

 

Imelda Kelly graduated from University College Dublin with an Honours Bachelor of Business and Legal Studies degree. She worked for a number of years in the non-governmental sector where she coordinated a law centre for people with disabilities. She was called to the New York Bar in January 2004, and subsequently attended the Honourable Society of King’s Inns and was called to the Bar of Ireland in 2005. She spent a year as a legal intern at the office of the Attorney General of Ontario in Toronto. She is a practicing barrister, and teaches on the College’s Honorable Society of King’s Inns and New York Bar Review programmes.

Gary FitzGerald, BA; Diploma in Legal Studies (Kings Inns), Barrister at Law.

 

 

 

 

Gary FitzGerald was awarded the Antonia O’Callaghan prize for Constitutional Law in 2005. He is a practicing barrister and lectures on the College’s Preparatory Programmes for the Entrance Examinations to the Kings Inns and the Law Society of Ireland. Gary also lectures Business Law on the College’s ACCA programmes.

Anastasia Ward, BCL; Barrister-at-Law.

Anastasia Ward is a practicing barrister and has over seven years teaching experience with the Law Society of Ireland’s Law School and on Legal Executive programmes in the Republic of Ireland. Anastasia teaches Contract, Tort and Civil Litigation on the College’s Institute of Legal Executive programmes.

Matthew Jolley, LL.B; Barrister-at-Law.

Matthew Jolley is a practicing barrister and was called to the Bar in 2006. Matthew teaches on the College’s LL.B degree programmes. Matthew also teaches Medical Negligence and Criminal Law.

Elizabeth Hughes, Dip LS

Elizabeth Hughes graduated from Letterkenny Institute of Technology in 2000 with a Certificate in Legal Studies. She then completed a Diploma in Professional Legal Studies in 2003. She sat on Council for the Irish Institute of Legal Executives for three years, and currently works for a high profile Dublin firm. Elizabeth teaches Legal Word Processing on the College’s Legal Secretarial Programme (ILEX).

Ronan Gallagher LLB; B.L.; Attorney-at-law (NY); Accredited Mediator

Ronan is a practicing civil and commercial barrister with extensive experience of mediating HR and commercial disputes as well as representing parties in mediations. Ronan was head of Friary Law’s Mediation Case Management team and assistant accredited mediation trainer from 2008 to 2010.

Ronan is a certified negotiator by the Harvard Program on Negotiation and is consultant negotiator for a number of multi-national companies based in dublin.

Ronan lectures on the Mediation and Negotiation modules on the MA in Dispute Resolution.

Eva Nagle, LL.B (ling.franc.) TCD, (Certificat en droit, Universite de Paris II), LL.M (LSE), B.L.

Eva Nagle is a 2003 Entrance Exhibition Scholar of Trinity College Dublin and graduated from Trinity with a degree in Law and French in 2007. She received a Graduate Merit Scholarship from the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2007 and completed her Masters in Law there, with Distinction, in 2008. The focus of her LL.M was intellectual property law and media law and her dissertation was on the area of comparative defamation law. She continues to research and publish in those areas.

he was called to the Irish Bar in July 2009 and is a practicing barrister. She teaches on the LL.M course on Comparative Media Law at Independent Colleges.

Geoffrey Corry BA(Mod) MSc(Mgmt) HDipEd

 

 

 

 

Geoffrey Corry is a family mediator with the state run Family Mediation Service and has mediated many interpersonal workplace and community disputes. He facilitated over 50 political dialogue workshops at the Glencree Centre for Reconciliation between the 1994 ceasefires and the 2007 St Andrews agreement within the Irish peace process. Former chairperson of theMediator’s Institute of Ireland.

Sarah Neligan, BCL; LL.M; Barrister-at-Law

Sarah Neligan graduated from University College Dublin with a BCL degree and an LL.M in European Law. She worked as a stagiaire in the European Commission in Brussels, before commencing practice as a barrister in 2006. Sarah teaches European Law on the College’s LL.B and Professional Law (FE1) programmes, and Introduction to the Irish Legal System on the College’s LL.B programme.