Justice Crothers teaches in Ukraine Monday, April 22, 2019
North Dakota Supreme Court Justice Daniel Crothers recently participated in two days of training for 38 newly appointed judges on the Ukraine High Anti-Corruption Court. Last week Crothers presented educational sessions in Kyiv, Ukraine on the rule of Law, fair and independent Courts and judicial decision-making. He joined two Canadian judges who presented training on the purpose and appropriate content of written judicial decisions.
Ukraine is an eastern European country, and a former Soviet Union state that gained its independence in 1991. Since then, Ukraine has struggled to free itself from Russian influence, including social upheavals during the Orange Revolution in 2004 and the Euromaidan Revolution in 2014. In the wake of these revolutions, Ukraine has increased its social and economic ties to Western Europe and the United States.
The High Anti-Corruption Court was established by action of the Ukrainian legislature with the backing of President Petro Poroshenko. Creation of the court has been a longtime demand of both the United States and the European Union.
The Anti-Corruption Court’s 38 judges were officially sworn in on April 11, 2019. Cases concerning corruption in Ukraine will be bought directly to the Anti-Corruption Court. A completely separate Appeal Chamber of the High Anti-Corruption Court will consider all appeals from the anti-corruption trial courts.
The Anti-Corruption courts will have 39 judges with 10 of them appointed to the Appeals Chamber. In an effort to protect members of the court, the judges and persons living with them, spouses, parents, brothers and sisters, grandparents, spouse’s parents, grandchildren, adopted children and foster parents will be provided with full security protection.
Crothers regularly writes and lectures on the interaction of technology and legal and judicial ethics, discovery and admissibility of electronically stored information, judicial disqualification, ethics for new judges and their families, the ethics of independent judicial investigation, ethics for judges in leadership, developing judicial leadership in a learning organization, and more. He has taught lawyers and judges throughout the United States and in Guam and the Virgin Islands. He is a past president of the State Bar Association of North Dakota and past chair of the American Bar Association Standing Committee on Client Protection, past chair of the ABA Center for Professional Responsibility’s Policy Implementation Committee, past member of the ABA President’s Taskforce on Cybersecurity, and past member of the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility. He is a member of the ABA Standing Committee on Professional Regulation and an adjunct faculty member at the National Judicial College at the University of Nevada-Reno.