Twenty-two law schools from across the country gathered to compete in the 2024 Wayne State Taft Transactional Law Invitational on Friday, March 22, 2024. This year’s event took place at the Southfield offices of Taft Stettinius & Hollister.

The competition results were as follows:

Buyer’s Counsel:

1st  Place Negotiations - University of Kansas School of Law

2nd Place Negotiations - William and Mary Law School

1st Place Drafting - University of Kansas School of Law

2nd  Place Drafting - Baylor University School of Law

Seller’s Counsel:

1st Place Negotiations - Georgetown University Law Center

2nd Place Negotiations - University of Oregon School of Law

1st Place Drafting - University of San Diego School of Law

2nd Place Drafting - Georgetown University Law Center

This invitational is an important component of a comprehensive learning experience crafted and overseen by Wayne Law Associate Professor of Law Eric Zacks and Taft attorney and Wayne Law alumnus Justin Hanna. Third-year Wayne Law students Ameera Hashwi, Camran Astani, Connor Schram, and Danny Harwood served as chairpersons for this year’s competition. The program is supported by the Taft Transactional Law Competition Fund, which was established in 2018.

The competition helps students in honing drafting, negotiating, and counseling skills, with two-member teams representing buyers and sellers in a complex acquisition. After a semester of drafting and revising, teams engage in two rounds of negotiations, receiving feedback from attorneys after each round.

Justin Hanna remarked, “Taft is proud to be a supporter of this critically important practical educational program for law students throughout the country interested in transactional law. Since its inception as a locally centered program for Wayne Law students, the Wayne State Taft Invitational has flourished and includes teams from regionally and nationally recognized law schools throughout the country. This practice-based learning approach with respect to business transaction negotiation and documentation helps put the participants leaps and bounds ahead of their peers as prospective lawyers. The expanded national program is a tribute to the success of Professor Zacks’ vision and the execution by the Wayne Law student chairs hosting the event.”

Attorneys serving as judges were:

• Justin Hanna ’15, Taft

• Joshua Borson ’13, Taft

• Peter Sugar ’70, Taft

• Ryan Mardini ’18, Taft

• Adomas Rauckis ’19, Taft

• Josh Unice ’19, Taft

• Will Friedman ’22, Taft

• Bruce Kahn ’71, Taft

• Summer Moukalled ’19, Taft

• Jamie Young ’21, Taft

• Ahmad Sabbagh ’19, Honigman

• Mazen Hajali ’21, Honigman

• Amy Smith ’17, Honigman

• Alex Monahan ’17, Varnum

• Jackson Buday ’21, Troutman Pepper

• Hillel Nadler ’14, Wayne State Law

• Danielle Graceffa ’06, Invest Detroit Foundation General Counsel

• Christopher Banerian ’14, WorkForce

• Christopher Attar ’14, General Motors

• Nick Hayes ’18, Paesano Akkashian

• DeLone Dawisha ’18, Dawisha Law

 “Wayne Law was excited to hold the competition again, and we were pleased to see so many schools participate. Taft has been a wonderful partner for, and supporter of, this program, and we are grateful to them. Our student
chairs really did a wonderful job coordinating this year’s competition, and, as always, the most valuable part of the competition was the student feedback sessions with the judges. We are appreciative of all of the attorneys that
donated their time to serve as judges,” said Zacks

The participating schools and students were:

Wayne Law: Lena Vushaj, Lydia Dunn

University of Kansas School of Law: Alli Baden, Jackie Jeschke, Andrew Abdelqader  

Widener University Commonwealth Law School: Helene Hess, Kiara Douglass, Anne Carrie Swoope

University of Mississippi School of Law: Mason Borneman, Ademide Adeoye

Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law: Miriam Wang, Ademide Adeoye

Charleston School of Law: Emily Sanders, James Mitchell

St. Mary’s University School of Law: Nydia Ramirez, Lauren Ramirez

William & Mary Law School: Cooper Quist, Hily Nichols

Baylor University School of Law: Ryan Cox, Andrew Cowden

University of Missouri-Kansas City: Aaron Mott, Alex Villalobos

University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law: Orelvis Dominguez, Shreyas Kafle

University of Oregon School of Law: Matthew Lee, Nathan Rice

Brooklyn Law School: Martha Dallman, Steve Mazzu, Keely Redhage

Georgetown University Law Center: Trey Wolf, Zoe Dettelbach

University of San Diego School of Law: Maria Miramontes, John DelMastro, Cesar Serrano

Southern University Law Center: Silas Thomas, Austin Opara, Peace Scott, Shaul Israel

DePaul: Ryley king, Betsy Pisabaj, Kaitlin Stanfield

St. Thomas University: Sharon Alfandary, Viviana Velez-Bowe

Washburn University School of Law: Carissa Occhipinto, Miaeda Hutchinson, Oliver Gilmore

Michigan State University College of Law: Edward Mosella, Haley Pflum

Emory University School of Law: Leah Shelton, Ryan Mayhan, Leah Shelton

University of Tennessee College of Law: Carson Jennings, Deji Adeniyi, Myles Roth

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