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Press Contact: Allegra Young, UT Law Communications, 471-7330
Professor, attorney helped UT Law students represent criminal defendants for 20 years
AUSTIN, Texas — UT Law Clinical Professor and Criminal Law Clinic Director Kenneth D. Schubb, J.D. '78, died in his sleep on Wednesday, November 19, 2003, after a brief illness. He was 52 years old. Dean Powers notified the faculty in the early morning of November 20.
"Ken Schubb was a wonderful friend to our Law School. His professional contributions for more than 20 years to our Criminal Defense Clinic helped hundreds of students learn, first hand, what it means to be a criminal defense lawyer and a compassionate person. He will be greatly missed. Our best thoughts and prayers are extended to his family and students," said UT Law Dean Bill Powers.
For twenty years, Professor Schubb worked as a supervising attorney at UT Law's Criminal Defense Clinic, and as its director since 1999. According to UT Law Professor Robert Dawson, who founded the Criminal Defense Clinic in 1974, Schubb helped supervise more than 1,200 students in their work on criminal defendants' cases. Those students handled more than 7,200 cases. Schubb also modernized the clinic's procedures and tightened its administrative controls.
Dawson stated, "Kenneth was totally devoted to clinical education and to its value in teaching students how to be effective advocates. He valued hard work, rigorous legal analysis, and imagination in representation. He was constantly pushing himself and students to greater achievement. He was absolutely devoted to the concept of equal justice under the law."
Schubb also taught a successful course on Negotiation in Criminal Cases. It was highly oversubscribed and, as far as UT officials could tell, the only one of its kind in the United States.
Long-time UT Law colleague and friend Terri LeClercq said, "Ken was an intense, 100% dedicated defender of 'the people out there.' He brought them here to the students to get them adequate representation. He taught his students that these people had the right to excellent representation."
LeClercq recalled that Schubb worked hard to change the inadequacy of the oral warning provided to drivers in DUI (driving while intoxicated) cases. "Ken asked judges to throw out cases based on the inadequacy of the oral warning, and they did. Eventually DPS changed its instruction so that their warning would be fairer."
Recent graduate Stephanie Townsend Allala, '02, remembered Schubb, saying, "He demanded that we give our best, and he was generous in helping us find it. He was utterly devoted to his family, and actively involved in every aspect of his children's lives. My favorite memory was of an evening when I brought my daughter along while I was studying. His son was working on a class project, experimenting with the velocity of parachute men. Ken was working late (as always), and in between his office duties, he managed the project, and invited my daughter to help. All evening, little parachute men went flying off the balcony of the third floor of the Connally Center, as the children recorded the time it took to reach the ground, and rode the elevator up and down to recover them. Ken was the efficient administrator, focusing on his son's project with all the energy and earnestness with which he approached his teaching. He managed to be an involved parent while running one of the best and busiest law school clinics in the country. His loss is a vacuum that cannot be filled."
Schubb was born in Jacksonville, Florida, on March 15, 1951. He attended Tulane on full scholarship in political science and taught for one year in an inner city school in New Orleans. After graduation in 1973, Schubb traveled through Europe, Saharan Africa, and the Middle East. Upon returning from the Middle East, he went to law school at UT at Austin, graduating in 1978. He clerked for the Texas Criminal Appeals Court. Later he taught at the Law School's Criminal Defense Clinic for 20 years and was its director for the last 5 years. He also pursued a private practice for a number of years.
Schubb is survived by his wife, Olivia Ruiz, J.D. '81, daughter Gabriela, 12, and son Diego, 8, a sister, Harriet, a brother, Mark, and other family and friends.
His funeral service will be held Friday, November 21 at 3:00 p.m. at the Congregation Beth Israel at 3901 Shoal Creek. His family requests that in lieu of flowers, charitable contributions be made to (1) ACLU, 1210 Rosewood Ave, Austin, TX 78702, (2) American Cancer Society, P.O. Box 1491000, Austin, TX 78714-9100, or (3) Congregation Beth Israel, 3901 Shoal Creek Blvd, Austin, TX 78756.