FSU Law is proud to announce the recipients of the 2026 Alumni Awards, honoring graduates and friends of the College of Law whose professional distinction and service have strengthened our law school and our communities.
Award Recipients
Distinguished Alum Award
This award recognizes a Florida State University College of Law graduate who is distinguished professionally and who has rendered outstanding service to the community, as well as to our College of Law. Factors considered in selecting the winner include professional distinction, good citizenship, and significant contributions benefiting the community, state, and nation.
Fred Karlinsky (’92) of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
Karlinsky is a shareholder and Chair of Greenberg Traurig’s Global Insurance Regulatory and Transactions Practice Group and serves on the firm’s Executive Committee. For more than 30 years, he has represented insurers, reinsurers, and other insurance-related entities on regulatory, transactional, and public policy matters, including transformational revisions to Florida’s property, workers’ compensation, medical malpractice, tort, and automobile insurance laws. A nationally and internationally recognized authority on insurance, he has been listed in Chambers USA, The Best Lawyers in America, and Florida Trend’s Legal Elite, and in 2025 he received the Florida Insurance Council’s Mark Trafton Distinguished Service Award, the organization’s highest peer-selected honor. Karlinsky chairs the College of Law’s Board of Visitors, previously served two terms on the FSU Foundation Board of Trustees, and has taught the annual Law and Risk Management spring break course as an adjunct professor since 2008. He helped establish the Karlinsky Family Endowed Scholarship and the Karlinsky Family Student Lounge in the College of Law’s Advocacy Center. He has also chaired Florida’s Supreme Court Judicial Nominating Commission, served as president of the Florida Supreme Court Historical Society, and held numerous leadership roles with the Orange Bowl Committee. Karlinsky lives in Weston with his wife, Autumn, and their two children: Allie, a second-year student at the College of Law, and Spencer, a junior at Florida State University.
Alumni Association Service Award
This award recognizes a Florida State University law school graduate who has rendered distinguished service to our College of Law over an extended period of time.
Lauren Angulo (’17) of West Palm Beach, Florida
Angulo is a dual-degree graduate of Florida State University, earning her B.A. in Political Science and Government and International Affairs and her J.D. from the College of Law. She is the founder and CEO of Venustas Law, a firm she established in 2021 to provide legal services to businesses, entrepreneurs, and talent in the creative and sports industries. Her practice focuses on contract negotiation, compliance, and business strategy, including business formation, contract drafting, brand collaborations, sponsorship agreements, and regulatory compliance. Angulo has remained actively engaged with the College of Law through sustained volunteer service, including coaching students in the Law Counseling Creators Competition, serving as a panelist for the 2025 Frontiers in Law and Technology Conference, and founding the FSU Law Oxford Alumni Network. She also participates in career fairs, alumni mixers, and professional panels for J.D. students, teaches contract drafting as an adjunct professor, and chairs the outreach committee of the Alumni Association Board of Directors.
Everyday Hero Award
This award recognizes a Florida State University law school graduate who is an early-to-mid-career public servant who enthusiastically uses their legal training to make a more just and equitable society.
Adrian Mood (’13) of Tallahassee, Florida
Mood is an Assistant State Attorney for the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida and currently serves as a Felony Division Chief in Leon County. His caseload focuses primarily on homicide, sexual crimes, and other violent felonies. Mood earned his Bachelor of Science in chemistry from Howard University. He is a Certified Public Manager and a member of the William H. Stafford American Inn of Court. He enjoys spending time with his wife, Kirsten Mood (’14), their two children, and their black lab, Howie. His hobbies include distance running, video games, and cheering for Chelsea Football Club.
Class of '66 Award
This award recognizes a non-Florida State University College of Law graduate who has rendered distinguished service to our law school and to the community. Each recipient is inducted into the Class of 1966 to commemorate the year that the Florida State University College of Law opened its doors.
Justice Carlos G. Muñiz of Tallahassee, Florida
Justice Muñiz is a graduate of the University of Virginia and Yale Law School. After law school, he clerked for Judge Thomas A. Flannery of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia and for Judge José A. Cabranes of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He later served in senior positions in the federal government and in the executive and legislative branches of Florida government. In January 2019, he joined the Supreme Court of Florida as the state’s 89th justice, and he served as chief justice from July 2022 to July 2026. For years, Justice Muñiz has taught at the FSU College of Law, offering courses on statutory interpretation and state constitutional law. He and his wife, Katie, live in Tallahassee and have three children, including a son who is a junior at FSU.
Exemplary Public Service Career Award
This award recognizes a Florida State University College of Law graduate who has dedicated their career to public service and who has demonstrated exceptional character, integrity, humility, and professionalism, as well as the highest regard for ethics.
Col. (Ret.) Richard E. “Dick” Gordon (’79) of Tallahassee, Florida
Raised in Palm Bay, Florida, Gordon graduated magna cum laude from Florida State University in 1976 and from the College of Law in 1979, where he was a member of the Law Review. After two years in private practice in Melbourne, he joined the Army Judge Advocate General’s Corps in 1981, serving as both defense counsel and prosecutor in courts-martial in Germany and Texas, and later earned a master’s degree in military law. Over his Army career, Gordon deployed to Northern Iraq and Southern Turkey for Operation Provide Comfort, to Homestead after Hurricane Andrew, and twice to Mogadishu, Somalia. At the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he served as personal legal advisor to Lt. Gen. Wesley K. Clark, helped write the military annexes to the Dayton Peace Accords, and advised on arms control negotiations involving the former Yugoslavia, Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus, and the Korean Peninsula. He was senior legal advisor to the Ground Component Commander during Operation Iraqi Freedom and, in 2004, principal legal advisor to Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba in the investigation of detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib, helping author the Taguba Report. He then served as a military judge at Fort Benning before retiring in 2007, and later spent eleven years as Chief of Administrative & Civil Law at Fort Benning. Today, Gordon volunteers with the Florida Guardian ad Litem Program and the Florida Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program. He and Ellen, his wife of 46 years, live in Tallahassee and have three adult children.