As the crowd cheers him on, Kyle Cauthron ’02 (center) vies for a fly-fishing trip to Montana, one of the most coveted items up for bid at this year’s public interest auction. Dubbed Auction 2000, the event raised a record-breaking $108,000 to support students working in public interest jobs this summer. The six-year-old event drew hundreds of students and faculty into the Ames Courtroom for the live portion of the auction. The amount raised also includes money from the silent auction as well as more than $50,000 in corporate sponsorships. Another popular item put up for bid by Professors Carol Steiker ’86 and Phil Heymann ’60, auctioneers for the event, was lunch with Al Sharpton, Ed Koch, and Professor Charles Ogletree, Jr. ’78 (or, as Ogletree described it, “an afternoon with America’s most controversial figures”), which sold for $1,400. An all-inclusive trip to London went for $1,500 and a stay with a Ghana Supreme Court Judge sold for $900. The Law School’s Scales of Justice, among the entertainers at the event, donated four performances to the auction, raising over $6,000. Organized by first-year students, the March event was chaired by Dan Bahar ’02, Joy Radice ’02, and Kerri Sherlock ’02. The Office of Public Interest Advising provided administrative support.
Photograph by Richard Chase