Feerick Center Awards and Benefit Reception

Christine Cesare ’84
Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP
James F. Gill Spirit of Hope Award

Christine (Chris) Cesare ’84 previously served as the global managing partner for the Litigation and Corporate Risk Practice and was a member of the Management Committee at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP. In that leadership role she helped manage the day-to-day worldwide operations of the firm. Ms. Cesare served as head of the Commercial Litigation Client Service Group from 2008 to 2013 and also previously served as a member of the firm’s Executive Committee and its Compensation Committee.

Her practice has always focused on complex commercial litigation, including class actions. Ms. Cesare has represented financial institutions in actions and class actions involving claims of breach of contract, fraud, lender liability, negligence, indemnification and unjust enrichment, as well as claims under various state and federal statutes, including consumer statutes. Her experience has involved advice and representation in connection with consumer mortgage matters implicating issues of predatory lending, TILA and RESPA violations, and claims of bad faith.

She has also represented financial institutions acting as corporate trustees and has experience defending corporate trustees in actions involving claims for breach of contract, negligence, indemnification, constructive trust, and breach of fiduciary duty. In the course of representing financial services companies issuing prepaid cards, Ms. Cesare has been involved in litigation matters challenging the issuance of such cards, including disclosure cases, as well as claims relating to rewards and loyalty programs.

Professor Elizabeth B. Cooper
Gail D. Hollister Dedication to Excellence Award

Elizabeth B. Cooper, the Faculty Director of the Feerick Center, teaches the Law School’s Legislative Advocacy Clinic. She has previously taught litigation/civil rights clinics, the Center’s Social Justice Clinic, and Institutional Reform Through the Courts (with Dean Emeritus Feerick), among other offerings. Her scholarship addresses issues of dignity and autonomy in numerous contexts—including HIV/AIDS and public health policies, the marriage equality rights of LGBTQ+ individuals, pressure on students/attorneys to conform their appearance to dominant cultural expectations in the workplace—as well as various attributes of clinical teaching pedagogy.

Before coming to Fordham, Professor Cooper taught briefly at Brooklyn Law School and was an adjunct law professor at Rutgers Law School (Newark). Previously, she was a Gibbons Fellow in Public Interest and Constitutional Law at Gibbons, P.C., and a Skadden Fellow/Staff Counsel at the ACLU AIDS Project. Following graduation from New York University School of Law, where she was a Root-Tilden Scholar, she clerked for the Honorable Anne E. Thompson (ret.) in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. She is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

Todd G. Cosenza ’98
Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP
Spirit of Service Award

Todd G. Cosenza ’98 is a partner in the Litigation Department and Co-Chair of the Securities Litigation Practice Group at Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP. His practice focuses on complex financial litigation, with an emphasis on securities class actions. He has obtained victories for his clients in a number of landmark shareholder class actions. Mr. Cosenza also regularly serves as counsel to independent audit and special committees in the context of confidential internal corporate investigations and advises senior executives and boards of directors on corporate governance matters, particularly those involving mergers and acquisitions.

He consistently has been recognized by leading legal and business publications for his work performed for clients, including by New York Law Journal, The Am Law Litigation Daily, Chambers USA, Legal 500 US, Lawdragon, Law360, The Best Lawyers in America, Super Lawyers, and Benchmark Litigation. He is the author of a number of articles on recent developments in corporate law and the federal securities laws. Mr. Cosenza serves on the Board of Trustees for the Supreme Court Historical Society and previously served as the Chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Securities Litigation Committee (2014-2016).

Mr. Cosenza served as the Chair of the President’s Council of Fordham University (2018-2021) and serves on the Board of Directors of the Fordham Law Alumni Association. He also serves on the Board of the Saint David’s School and Catholic Charities for the Archdiocese of New York. For his pro bono work, Mr. Cosenza was named as the recipient of Her Justice’s 2017 Commitment to Justice Award.

Margaret Giordano Friedberg ’88
Spirit of Service Award

Margaret Giordano Friedberg ’88 served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of New York from 1991 to 2005. In that position, she served as the Chief and Deputy Chief of the Narcotics Unit, Chief of the General Crimes Unit, as well as Deputy Chief of the Public Corruption Unit, and Deputy Chief of the Violent Crimes Unit. Ms. Friedberg returned to EDNY as a Special Assistant United States Attorney from 2014 to 2015, under then, United States Attorney, later, United States Attorney General, Loretta E. Lynch.

During her federal prosecutorial career, she was awarded the United States Department of Justice National Director’s Award for Superior Performance for three consecutive years in 1994, 1995, and 1996. Ms. Friedberg was also awarded the Stimpson Medal of Honor by the New York City Bar Association in 1998, the Federal Law Enforcement Foundation Award in 1996, and the Federal Law Enforcement Officer’s Award in 1995.

Following her career as a federal prosecutor, Ms. Friedberg was an adjunct professor of law teaching appellate writing. Prior to becoming a prosecutor, Ms. Friedberg was a litigation associate at Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy, and clerked for the Honorable Carol B. Amon, most recently, Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

Dora Galacatos ’96
Champion of Justice Award

Dora Galacatos ’96 has helped lead Fordham Law School’s Feerick Center for Social Justice since its inception in 2006. She has experience working in legal academia, city government, the nonprofit sector, and legal services. Prior to attending law school, Ms. Galacatos worked for the New York City Department of Juvenile Justice and the New York City Mayor’s Office of Drug Abuse Policy from 1989 to 1993, where she focused on program development, program evaluation, and policy analysis.

Following law school and as part of a Skadden Fellowship (1997-1998), Ms. Galacatos worked at Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation, in Washington Heights, Manhattan. Ms. Galacatos served as Staff Director to the New York City Family Homelessness Special Master Panel, working alongside Dean Emeritus John D. Feerick. Ms. Galacatos also served as a law clerk to the late Honorable Milton Pollack (1996-1997) and to the Honorable Paul A. Crotty (2005-2006), both District Judges in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Ms. Galacatos is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where she received her Bachelor of Arts in History; the New School for Social Research, where she was a Jacob M. Kaplan Fellow and received a Master of Science in Urban Policy; and Temple University Beasley School of Law where she received an LL.M. in trial advocacy. Ms. Galacatos has been recognized by the New York County Lawyers Association, Manhattan Legal Services, Mobilization for Justice, and most recently, the American Association of Law School Section on Pro Bono and Access to Justice.

In 2025, Ms. Galacatos received the Law School’s Eugene J. Keefe award, honoring her service to the Fordham community. She is a former chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Civil Court Committee.

Professor Willajeanne F. McLean ’86
Honorable Deborah A. Batts Life of Commitment Award 

Willajeanne F. McLean ’86 educates and mentors aspiring lawyers at the University of Connecticut School of Law. A member of the UConn law faculty since 1991, where she teaches Trademark Law, Torts, and a seminar on comparative intellectual property law, she served as interim dean for the Law School for the 2012-2013 academic year.

Professor McLean has taught internationally and was a Fulbright Fellow at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland, where she taught Comparative EU and U.S. Intellectual Property Law and lectured at the Intellectual Property Law Institute of the Jagiellonian University in Cracow.

She has served in various capacities on many committees and boards, such as the Fordham Law Alumni Association, the Steering Committee for the Fordham Alumni Attorneys of Color affinity group, the Wellesley College Alumnae Association Board of Directors, The Discovery Center Board (now RE-Center: Race & Equity in Education), and was a member of the Consulting Scholar Committee for the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame and an inaugural member of the Fordham University Alumni Board.