College of Law

Professor Bruce A. Markell was appointed the professor of bankruptcy law and practice at Northwestern in 2015. From 2013 to 2015, he was the Jeffrey A. Stoops professor of law at Florida State University College of Law, and prior to that, he was a United States bankruptcy judge for the District of Nevada. After law school, Markell clerked for then-judge Anthony M. Kennedy on the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Before taking the bench, he practiced bankruptcy and business law in Los Angeles for ten years and was a law professor for fourteen years. He is the author of numerous articles on bankruptcy and commercial law, and a co-author of four law school casebooks. He has been a visiting professor at, among other schools, Peking University School of Law in Beijing and Harvard Law School. He contributes to Collier on Bankruptcy and is a member of Collier’s editorial advisory board. He is a conferee of the National Bankruptcy Conference, a fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy, a charter member of the International Insolvency Institute, and a member of the American Law Institute. He is a founding member of the NITA-trained faculty of the Advanced Consumer Bankruptcy Practice Institute. Markell also consults with the International Monetary Fund on insolvency-related issues (having been part of the IMF’s missions to Ireland, Bosnia, Belarus, Montenegro, Serbia, Georgia, and Greece), and was the primary drafter of Kosovo’s current bankruptcy law. He is an associate editor of the Bankruptcy Law Letter and regularly contributes articles to that publication. In 2022, Markell received the Lawrence P. King Award from the Commercial Law League of America.

Professor Robert W. Miller is an assistant professor of law at the University of South Dakota Knudson School of Law. He was previously a partner in the corporate restructuring department of Manier & Herod, P.C. in Nashville, Tennessee. His practice focused on the representation of insurance companies in large national and international insolvency matters as well as chapter 11 trustees and unsecured creditors' committees in regional cases. He also taught the Business Associations class at the Nashville School of Law. Prior to practicing, Miller served as the law clerk for the Honorable William L. Stocks of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of North Carolina. He is a graduate of the Emory University School of Law. 

Professor Ralph Brubaker, considered a leading bankruptcy scholar, is the James H.M. Sprayregen professor of law at the Illinois College of Law. Brubaker rejoined the Illinois faculty in 2004, returning to his alma mater after serving as a member of the faculty at the Emory University School of Law for 10 years, where he was also the faculty adviser to the Emory Bankruptcy Developments Journal. Brubaker previously clerked for Judge James K. Logan, of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. Later, he practiced in the bankruptcy and corporate reorganization group of Squire, Sanders & Dempsey (now Squire Patton Boggs) in Cleveland, Ohio. Brubaker is co-author of "Bankruptcy Law: Principles, Policies, and Practice" (with Charles J. Tabb) and has written dozens of journal articles and essays exploring all facets of federal bankruptcy law, particularly Chapter 11 corporate reorganizations and the complex jurisdictional and procedural aspects of federal bankruptcy proceedings. He was awarded the 2003 Editors’ Prize from The American Bankruptcy Law Journal for his article, “Of State Sovereign Immunity and Prospective Remedies: The Bankruptcy Discharge as Statutory Ex parte Young Relief,” 76 American Bankruptcy Law Journal 461 (2002). Brubaker is the editor-in-chief and a contributing author for West’s Bankruptcy Law Letter, and he has served on the editorial advisory boards of The American Bankruptcy Law Journal and the American Bankruptcy Institute Law Review. He is a member of the American Law Institute, a conferee of the National Bankruptcy Conference, and a fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy, for which he has served as the scholar-in-residence. Brubaker has been a member of the executive committee of the board of directors for the American Bankruptcy Institute, and he was a member of the advisory committee on 363 sales for the ABI’s 2014 Commission to Study the Reform of Chapter 11.

Professor Steve R. Johnson is the Dunbar Family Professor of Law at the Florida State University College of Law. Johnson has received numerous teaching awards. His courses include Taxation, Business Planning, Bankruptcy, Legislation, and Administrative Law. He also works with Florida State’s highly successful moot court program and has coached a national championship team and many other award-winning Florida State teams in moot court competitions around the country.
Johnson is the author of two casebooks and scores of articles and book chapters in leading U.S. and foreign publications. His work has been cited in many decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court and other federal and state tribunals. He has been quoted in hundreds of media reports, been a featured speaker at over 100 professional and academic conferences and has served as a consultant to Congress and federal courts and agencies. He has been a featured columnist for State Tax Notes and an associate editor of the American Bar Association Section of Taxation News Quarterly. Before teaching law, Johnson practiced law at a large New York City law firm, served as a senior attorney with the IRS Chief Counsel’s Office, and served as a special assistant United States attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice.

Judge Karen K. Specie was appointed to the bench on July 25, 2012. She serves as the chief and only bankruptcy judge for the Northern District of Florida, presiding over cases in Tallahassee, Gainesville, Panama City, and Pensacola. Judge Specie began her legal career with a law firm on the 28th floor of the RCA building in mid-town Manhattan, New York, representing creditors in commercial litigation and bankruptcy. From there she relocated to Tampa, where she practiced with then Fowler, White, Boggs, et. al. She since has practiced solo and as a shareholder with firms in Gainesville; just prior to taking the bench, Judge Specie was of counsel to Akerman LLP as part of its Bankruptcy and Reorganization practice group in Jacksonville, Florida. While in private practice, Judge Specie focused on commercial litigation and commercial and consumer bankruptcy cases throughout Florida and the Southeast. Judge Specie has taught Bankruptcy and Secured Transactions as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where she still teaches Advanced Bankruptcy. She has served as a Chapter 7 Panel Trustee for the Northern District of Florida; is a founder of the Federal Bar Association for North Central Florida; and has been a member of the Bankruptcy/UCC Committee of the Business Law Section of The Florida Bar since the early 1990s. Judge Specie currently serves on the Executive Council of the Florida Bar Business Law Section, is a fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy, and is a member of ABI, INSOL, IWIRC, and NCBJ. In 2018, Judge Specie chaired the committee that organized and presented the Bankruptcy Roundtable at the Eleventh Circuit Judicial Conference. In addition to traveling throughout the Northern District to perform her judicial duties, Judge Specie routinely speaks at CLE programs for various organizations such as The Florida Bar, the Alabama Bar Association, the Jacksonville Bankruptcy Bar Association, and the Northern District of Florida Bankruptcy Bar Association.