Leah Thompson, Law’17, will be spending her second consecutive summer in Europe. This year, she completed the Public International Law (PIL) Program at Herstmonceux Castle, the Queen’s-owned Bader International Study Centre in East Sussex, U.K. She has now accepted an offer to intern next summer at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, Netherlands.
 
Thompson’s experiences in one of the Faculty’s Global Law Programs at the Castle led her to this internship. While completing the PIL program, she and her classmates toured a number of different international courts. This sparked her interest in working for the ICTY. “I had studied the tribunal’s work before, but I couldn’t really picture myself working there until I got a chance to speak to its lawyers and interns,” she says.  “I remember sitting in the ICTY and thinking I could do this.”

Katrina Gustafson, a PIL instructor and ICTY prosecutor, was one lawyer she talked to at the tribunal. Thompson took the International Criminal Law course co-taught by Gustafson and learned about the tribunal’s complex work interpreting and applying international treaties and its own enabling statute. “Taking specialized courses in public international law made my application more competitive, since I could point to the courses as proof of my demonstrated interest in international humanitarian law and international criminal law.”

The ICTY is an ad hoc court established by the United Nations to prosecute serious crimes committed during the Yugoslav Wars. Thompson will be a Chambers Intern in the Office of the President. In this role, she will assist the judges of the tribunal by doing legal research and drafting memoranda, by helping draft orders and judgments, and by writing reports on court proceedings. Joining her will be a select group of law students drawn from around the world.

The prospect of getting hands-on experience in international criminal law excites Thompson. “Working in the judicial chambers will give me an even better understanding of how these tribunals interpret and apply the law,” she says. “This internship will be an excellent opportunity to test the waters and see if I would enjoy working overseas in the future.”

Thompson is also looking forward to interacting with legal professionals and students from many other nations. “I’ll have an opportunity to build my network among professionals and students in the area of law that I want to practice.”