FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 16, 2003

CONTACT                                 
Judith Berrett
Director of Member and Community Relations
206-727-8212
judithb@wsba.org 

Seattle Lawyer Katie O'Sullivan Elected to WSBA Board of Governors

Seattle, Washington, April 16, 2003 — Seattle lawyer Katie O'Sullivan has been elected to the Washington State Bar Association (WSBA) Board of Governors. She becomes the second person elected to the at-large position representing the Washington Young Lawyers Division (WYLD); this position was created in 2001. Ms. O'Sullivan was nominated by the WYLD Board of Trustees and elected by the WSBA Board of Governors. Her three-year term will begin in September 2003.

Ms. O'Sullivan is an associate in the Litigation Department at Perkins Coie. Prior to joining Perkins Coie, she served as law clerk to Hon. M. Margaret McKeown, U.S. Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit, and law clerk to Hon. Harold H. Greene, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Recently, Ms. O'Sullivan was part of the Perkins Coie team that worked on the IOLTA (Interest on Lawyers' Trust Account) case, Brown v. Legal Foundation of Washington, in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Washington state's IOLTA program. For her work on the IOLTA case, Ms. O'Sullivan was a co-recipient of the King County Bar Foundation's Champion of Justice Award and the Perkins Coie Pro Bono Leadership Award.

Ms. O'Sullivan received her B.A. from Yale University, cum laude in 1991, and her J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, cum laude in 1996.

Since 2000, Ms. O'Sullivan has served on the board of Passages Northwest, a nonprofit organization dedicated to instilling leadership and courage in girls and women through the outdoors, environment and the arts.

The Washington State Bar Association is a private, nonprofit organization authorized by the Washington Supreme Court to license the state's 27,300 lawyers. The WSBA both regulates lawyers under the authority of the Court and serves its members as a professional association — all without public funding. As a regulatory agency, it administers the bar exam, provides record-keeping and licensing functions, and administers the lawyer discipline program. As a professional association, the WSBA provides continuing legal education for attorneys, in addition to numerous other educational and member service activities.

Active members of the WSBA are also members of the WYLD until the year in which he or she turns 36, or the fifth year in which he or she has been admitted to practice, whichever is later. One-quarter of the WSBA's active members are currently members of the WYLD.

Perkins Coie is a leading international law firm, with nearly 600 attorneys serving clients from 14 offices across the United States and China. The firm represents clients that range in size from Fortune 100 companies to startups, and has historically represented market leaders in traditional and cutting-edge technology industries.