To: LEGAL AFFAIRS EDITORS

Contact: Martha Phan of Philadelphia Bar Association, +1-215-238-6346 (O), +1-215-715-4675 (C), mphan@philabar.org

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 15 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Philadelphia Bar Association is celebrating women in the profession at its Quarterly Meeting and Luncheon at noon on Monday, October 20 at the Park Hyatt Philadelphia at the Bellevue.

A panel of female executives from across Philadelphia will discuss strategies for female leadership, moderated by CBS-TV 3's weekend anchor Mary Stoker Smith. Panelists include Arlene Ackerman, CEO/Superintendent, School District of Philadelphia; Nina M. Gussack, chair, executive committee, Pepper Hamilton LLP; Tara Weiner, manager partner, Philadelphia office of Deloitte & Touche USA LLP; and Ahmeenah Young, president and CEO, Pennsylvania Convention Center Authority.

Roberta D. Liebenberg will also be honored with the 2008 Sandra Day O'Connor Award. Established by the Association's Women in the Profession Committee in 1993, the O'Connor award is conferred annually on a female attorney who has demonstrated superior legal talent, achieved significant legal accomplishments and has furthered the advancement of women in both the profession and the community.

"I am very honored and humbled at having been selected," Leibenberg said. "It is especially meaningful to me because I am following in the footsteps of the many incredibly talented and distinguished women lawyers and judges who have done so much to help remove the barriers confronting women in the profession."

"Bobbi embodies the example set by Sandra Day O'Connor and exemplifies every criteria of this award as someone at the top of her field, a trailblazing and truly accomplished lawyer, who also devotes herself to being an advocate for women," said Maria A. Feeley, co-chair of the Women in the Profession Committee.

Currently a partner at Fine, Kaplan and Black, Leibenberg was named as one of The National Law Journal's 50 Most Influential Women Lawyers in America in May 2007. She has chaired numerous Philadelphia Bar Association and American Bar Association committees and currently serves on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's Interbranch Commission for Gender, Racial and Ethnic Fairness.

She is an elected member of the American Law Institute and has written and lectured extensively on a wide range of subjects, including antitrust and class actions, as well as issues pertaining to gender, racial and ethnic fairness in the justice system.

In addition, Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Senior Judge Albert W. Sheppard Jr. will be presented with the 2008 Justice William J. Brennan Jr. Distinguished Jurist Award. The Brennan award recognizes a jurist who adheres to the highest ideals of judicial service.

"Judge Sheppard has been a beacon for innovation in the administration of justice," said Rhonda Hill Wilson, chair of the Brennan Award Committee. "We recognize how he has created this new paradigm while maintaining the rights of all parties."

Judge Sheppard is now a senior judge and in his 25th year on the Court of Common Pleas. He has presided in the family, criminal and civil divisions and is presently the team leader of the court's Commerce Program. He was elected to the Common Pleas Court in November 1983 and retained in 1993 and 2003.

He acted as chairman of the Judicial Study Committee (Sheppard Committee) appointed by state Supreme Court Justice James T. McDermott as the committee to make recommendations to our Supreme Court relative to suggested improvement for the Philadelphia Common Pleas Court. In 1990, he received the Golden Crow Bar Award from the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Judges for his work on this committee.

In 2003, he received the Distinguished Jurist Award from the John Peter Zenger Law Society.

Tickets to the luncheon are $50 for Association members and $55 for non-members and are available at www.philadelphiabar.org.

SOURCE Philadelphia Bar Association

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