Members of the Commission

Peter J. Kiernan
New York, New York

Peter J. Kiernan, the Chairman of the Law Revision Commission, was appointed as a member of the Commission and its Chairman by Governor David A. Paterson in December 2010. He served as Counsel to Governor Patterson from 2008 through 2010. Mr. Kiernan has had a long history of public service in government. He was counsel to the deputy mayor for finance of the City of New York, chief counsel to the New York State Senate Minority, and served in the administration of Governor Mario Cuomo. He also served as a trustee on the Citizen’s Budget Commission.

At the New York law firm of Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge, Mr. Kiernan specialized in public finance.

Mr. Kiernan is a graduate of Cornell Law School. In addition to his Cornell law degree, Mr. Kiernan holds degrees from John Carroll University, the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and the Cornell University Johnson School of Management.

Michael J. Hutter
Albany, New York

Michael J. Hutter was appointed as a Member of the Law Revision Commission in 1997. He is a Professor of Law at Albany Law School where he teaches, among other subjects, Evidence and Antitrust. He is Special Counsel to the law firm of Powers & Santola. Professor Hutter served as the Executive Director of the Law Revision Commission from 1979 to 1984. He was a Law Clerk to Judge Matthew J. Jasen of the New York State Court of Appeals. Commissioner Hutter is a member of the advisory group to the American Law Institute Restatement of the Law of Unfair Competition, and Editor, Model Jury Charges in Business Torts Cases. In 1998, he was nominated for the position of Associate Judge of the New York Court of Appeals by the Commission on Judicial Nomination.

He is a member of the American Bar Association and a member of the ABA Sections on Antitrust Law, Patent, Trademark and Copyright Law, and Litigation. He served as Chairman of the ABA Business Torts Litigation Committee from 1981 through 1984. Professor Hutter is a Fellow and Member of the New York State Bar Association and a member of the Sections on Antitrust Law and Trial Lawyers. He served as Chairman of the Appellate Practice Committee from 1989 through 1995. He is also a member of the Albany County Bar Association and served on its Board of Directors from 1986 through 1989. He served as Reporter for the New York State Bar Association’s Special Committee on Proposed Code of Evidence from 1990 through 1994. He is the author of numerous articles on antitrust and unfair competition. He received his J. D. from Boston College where he was a member of and Editor-in-Chief of the Boston College Law Review (Annual Survey) and a member of The Order of the Coif.

John A. Cirando
Syracuse, New York

John A. Cirando was appointed as a member of the Law Revision Commission in 2006. He is a partner of the law firm of D.J. and J.A. Cirando, Esqs., located in Syracuse, New York. His practice is concentrated on appellate advocacy. Commissioner Cirando has been named to the 2011 “New York Super Lawyers – Upstate” list. It is the 3rd time since 2009 that he has received this honor.

He served as Chief Assistant District Attorney in the Onondaga County District Attorney’s Office and was a member of the United States Army, Judge Advocate General Corps. He has been active both in local and state bar associations, serving as Chairperson of both the New York State Bar Association’s Committee on County Courts and the New York State Bar Association’s Public Relations Committee, and as Secretary and member of the Board of Directors of the Onondaga County Bar Association. He has taught as an adjunct professor of law at Syracuse University College of Law and authored the 2004-2005 Survey of Criminal Law in New York State for the Syracuse University Law Review.

He is general counsel for Vera House, Inc., a not-for-profit that works to end domestic violence and sexual assault, and in 2005, received the Sister Mary Vera Recognition Award. He has been a member of the St. Bonaventure University Board of Trustees and is currently serving as Vice-Chair and member of the Board of Trustees of Loretto Health & Rehabilitation Center.

He received his B.A. from St. Bonaventure University and his J.D. from S.U.N.Y. at Buffalo, School of Law.

Jay C. Carlisle II
Hudson, New York

Jay C. Carlisle II was appointed to the Commission in 2009. He is a Professor of Law at Pace Law School where he has taught courses in Civil Procedure, Criminal Procedure, Negotiations, Professional Responsibility, Civil Litigation in New York, Dispute Resolution, Remedies, Civil Rights Law and the Legal Profession. He is the recipient of the first annual Barbara Salken Outstanding Professor Award.

He lectures for the Practising Law Institute, the New York State Trial Lawyers Institute, the Office of Court Administration, and the New York State Judicial Institute. The American Bar Association and the American Law Institute presented Professor Carlisle with a Harrison Tweed Special Merit Award for his contributions to continuing legal education.

Since 1999 Professor Carlisle has served as a referee for the New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct and has been a special master for the Supreme Court and New York since 1980. He has testified as an expert on New York law before state and federal courts and before the International Court of Arbitration in Paris and the High Court of Appeals in London. Also, Carlisle is the recipient of several Bar Association awards for his pro bono service.

He has published extensively in the area of civil litigation, procedure and professional responsibility and his scholarship on New York law has been cited by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and by the New York State Court of Appeals. For many years, Professor Carlisle served as a member of the Board of Editors for the fourteen-volume treatise on New York Civil Practice by Weinstein Korn and Miller.

Professor Carlisle is a Fellow of the New York State Bar Foundation and an elected life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation.

He received his AB in 1965 from the University of California at Los Angeles and his JD in 1969 from the University of California, Davis, School of Law. From 1969 to 1970 Professor Carlisle was a graduate student at the School of International Affairs and the Institute of Latin American Studies at Columbia University.

Alfred J. Weiner (Ret.)
Wesley Hills, New York

Alfred J. Weiner was appointed to the Commission in 2014. He is Of Counsel to the law firm Mandel, Katz & Brosnan LLP located in Valley Cottage, New York. He practices primarily in the area of mediation and arbitration.

He retired as Justice of the New York Supreme Court after serving for more than 40 years on the bench including that position as well as Surrogate and Family Court Judge in Rockland County.

He has many published decisions in the areas of family and matrimonial law, personal injury, civil practice, contract, medical malpractice and surrogate practice.

His professional activities have included former executive committee member of the Supreme Court Judges Association, past President of the New York State Surrogates Association, and Family Court Judges Association. He was a member of the Surrogates Court Rules and Advisory Committee to the Chief Administrative Judge and the Family Court Advisory Committee. He is also a former member of the New York State C.L.E. Board.

His civic activities include founder and associate member of the Advisory Board of Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Rockland County, past president and current Board member of Jewish Family Service and Board member of the Jewish Federation. Past President of Rockland County Historical Society, Mental Health Association, and Rockland Children’s Psychiatric Center Foundation.

He served in the U.S. Army Judge Advocates General Corps. He taught as an adjunct professor of law at Pace Law School.

Justice Weiner received his BA and his JD from Syracuse University and its College of Law.

Commission Staff

Rose Mary Bailly is the Executive Director of the Law Revision Commission. She also is Special Counsel to the Aging Law & Policy Program of the Government Law Center of Albany Law School and an Adjunct Professor of Law at Albany Law School.

Ms. Bailly is the author the West’s Practice Commentaries to Article 81, Mental Hygiene Law, and West’s Practice Commentary and Forms to Article 81, Mental Hygiene, and co-author with Barbara Hancock of West’s Practice Commentaries to article 5, title 15 of the General obligations Law, powers of attorney. She is the author of a column on guardianship for Victimization of the Elderly and Disabled, a journal on prevention of abuse, mistreatment and neglect. She is the co-author with Elizabeth Loewy, J.D., of FINANCIAL EXPLOITATION OF THE ELDERLY (Civic Research Institute, Inc., 2007). She is an Associate Editor of, and contributing author to GUARDIANSHIP PRACTICE IN NEW YORK (Robert Abrams, Esq., ed.-in-chief 1997).

Ms. Bailly is a member of the American Bar Association, Real Property and Probate Section, the New York State Bar Association’s Elder Law Section and its Executive Committee. She serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Government Journal of Law & Policy, a joint publication of the Government Law Center of Albany Law School and the Committee on Attorneys in Public Service of the New York State Bar Association. Ms. Bailly is a Fellow of the Brookdale Center on Aging of Hunter College. She is a graduate of Fordham University School of Law where she served as a Commentary Editor for the Fordham Law Review.

Kenneth F. Joyce is the Executive Director Emeritus of the Commission. He served as Executive Director of the Commission from 1984 to 2000. He is a member of the faculty of the State University of New York, Buffalo Law School. His teaching interests include federal taxation, trusts and estates. He is a member of the American College of Trusts and Estates Counsel. He serves on New York’s EPTL-SCPA Legislative Advisory Committee and on the Surrogate’s Practice Committee of the New York Office of Court Administration.

Professor Joyce is the co-author of Chapter 17 of the treatise, JUDICIAL CONTROL OF ADMINISTRATIVE ACTION (with Louis Jaffe) and numerous articles on federal taxation. He served as law clerk to the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts and the U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit. He received his LL.B. from Boston College and his LL.M. from Harvard University, where he was a Ford Fellow.

Members

Senator John J. Bonacic
Chair, Senate Judiciary Committee

Assemblyman Joseph Lentol
Chair, Assembly Codes Committee

Senator Michael F. Nozzolio
Chair, Senate Codes Committee

Assemblywoman Helene E. Weinstein
Chair, Assembly Judiciary Committee