17 minutes. That is how long the prosecution claimed it took our client, an engineering student visiting the U.S. from a war-torn country, to attempt a homicide and flee. When I mapped the cell-tower pings, calculated the distances, and cross-referenced the surveillance timestamps, their argument collapsed. Physics, it turned out, would be our best defense.
Continue readingLaw & Society
Why I Came to Law School: Health Care Through a Legal Lens
As a Black woman, I’m cognizant of the structural racism and sexism implanted within the U.S. healthcare system. As a pregnant-capable person, of the growing limitations surrounding reproductive health. And as a close relative of a recovering alcoholic, of the stigma and inaccessibility of care shrouding some patients, particularly harm reductive care. Life experience and professional engagement have deepened my investment in healthcare justice. As such, I’m focalizing my desire to practice through a bioethics lens with the hope of improving patient safety, health outcomes, and patient autonomy through health law and policy.
Continue readingThe Accidental Advocate
This guest post was written by Margie Palladino ’85, Executive Director of Mass Family Advocacy Coalition (MFAC) and candidate to serve on the Governor’s Council for Massachusetts.
Boston College Law School teaches the practice of law in the Jesuit tradition of service to others. Of all the lessons I learned there, one has stayed with me throughout my life: our legal system does not affect everyone equally.
As a law student, I was taught that people who are marginalized or lack resources can experience our justice system very differently. When you don’t have the money, the support, or even the “right-color” skin, justice can be much harder to reach.
That lesson planted a seed. I just didn’t pay much attention to it at the time.
Continue readingAI Poses Opportunities, Risks for Higher Education
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
Generative AI is bringing Schumpeterian disruption to the stodgy world of higher education. As in other areas of the economy, the AI revolution is changing the university landscape. It is exposing long-standing flaws in the institution, perhaps most fundamentally its overreliance on exams, term papers, and grades as proxies for learning. This moment of creative destruction poses both challenges and opportunities for administrators like me and the students we serve.
Continue readingThe Water Fight over Data Centers Is a Distraction. The Grid Fight Is the Real Story.
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
Meta recently announced it would expand Project Hyperion, its data center under construction in Richland Parish, Louisiana, into a 5-gigawatt, $50 billion facility that will be one of the largest AI campuses in the world. The announcement landed amid an increasingly organized, bipartisan movement to block future data center construction. By one estimate, opponents blocked or delayed 75 projects representing $130 billion in investment in the first quarter of 2026 alone, citing water and electricity consumption among other concerns. But a closer look at these concerns shows that some of the loudest objections do not survive contact with the numbers.
Continue readingThe Apple-Epic Feud Goes to the Supreme Court Over a Question of Judicial Power
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
In what has become an annual tradition, the last day of the Supreme Court term was marked by blockbuster opinions on several hot-button topics. But hidden among the resolution of this year’s cases was an interesting note about next year’s docket. The Court agreed to review a contempt order in Apple’s years-long antitrust fight with Epic Games. At the center of the fight is a deceptively technical question with a long history: How literally should courts read their own orders when policing fast-moving industries?
Continue readingAI Speech Is Protected, But Not Immune From Liability
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
Last week, I explained why many generative AI outputs constitute speech that warrants First Amendment protection. This post explores the ramifications of that conclusion. Importantly, this protection does not mean chatbots are immune from liability. Courts, litigants, and regulators still have meaningful tools to address the consequences of generative AI activity. The key question is not whether AI speech can be regulated, but what the regulation seeks to do and what effect enforcement would have on speech interests.
Continue readingAre Social Media Bans for Children Justified?
I have been a proud Luddite against social media ever since Instagram, Snapchat, and other platforms have captured the attention of my generation. Those around me know to avoid the topic if they do not want to listen to a condescending rant that reminds them of their grandmother. I begrudgingly maintain a Linkedin account, but other than that, I try to stay true to my belief that social media should play an extremely limited role, if any, in our society. My initial convictions about this subject began after listening to Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist at NYU, give a lecture connecting the youth mental health crisis to the prevalent usage of smartphones and social media among Gen Z. Many of my psychology classes and internship experiences during my undergrad years reaffirmed these beliefs, and I have not shut up about it since.
Continue readingShould the First Amendment Protect Generative AI Outputs?
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
The most important free speech question of the decade may not be about social media. It may be about chatbots. As generative AI reshapes how people communicate, courts and legislators must confront whether and how the First Amendment protects AI outputs. Last year, the first court to face this question punted, explaining at the motion to dismiss stage that it was “not prepared” yet to hold that a large language model’s output is speech. That case settled without a definitive answer. But the question won’t stay dormant, and First Amendment principles compel a clear conclusion: many chatbot outputs are protected speech, which should shape how courts handle AI-related litigation.
Continue readingSupreme Court Considers FCC’s Jury Trial Problem
This guest post by BC Law Professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Daniel Lyons first appeared in the AEIdeas Blog.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has loomed large on the Supreme Court’s docket recently. Last term, the Justices addressed E-Rate fraud prevention efforts, the agency’s authority to bind courts, and the constitutionality of its Universal Service Program. Now the Commission is before the High Court. This new case, FCC v. AT&T, asks whether the FCC’s power to levy punitive fines violates the Seventh Amendment right to a trial by jury—a question whose resolution could reshape not just telecommunications regulation but the balance of power among agencies, courts, and juries.
Continue reading
BC Law: Impact 