Some ACLU supporters choose to help by donating their financial resources. Others lend their talent and time.
However, David Moran and Kris Olsson of Ann Arbor have devoted all of the above to the ACLU of Michigan for years.
Not only has the couple made a significant five year financial pledge, they regularly support our Annual Dinner and have the ACLU in their estate plans. David is one of our most consistent and successful cooperating attorneys, serving on the State Board of Directors and the statewide Lawyers Committee.
David and Kris further demonstrate their dedication to social justice by the diversity of their commitments. In addition to supporting the ACLU, they also give to the Huron River Watershed Council, the University of Michigan, and the Humane Society. Their two young daughters are encouraged to be independent, and the family speaks openly about voting, politics, and their support of the Humane Society.
A Lifetime of Liberties
Throughout the years, both David and Kris have supported the ACLU through their personal and professional lives.
As early as high school, David recalls becoming interested in the ACLU while writing a letter on “The Rights of Students” in response to his high school holding Christian-themed assemblies and routinely proselytizing students. Kris recollects becoming profoundly concerned with free speech issues during protests against military research in college. Kris has been an ACLU member as long as she can remember.
Even from different starting points, the couple has taken much of their journey together. The Michigan woman and the boy from Oklahoma first met at the University of Michigan. The couple moved to England while David did graduate work in math and physics at Cambridge University. A testament to their passion for learning, they again moved to upstate New York while Kris attended graduate school in biology at Syracuse and David worked on his Ph.D. in theoretical physics at Cornell.
Returning to the place they met, they settled in Ann Arbor as Kris finished her graduate work in natural resources and pursued her passion for protecting the natural environment. David achieved his is J.D. at the University of Michigan Law School after becoming interested in the intersection between science and the law during his physics studies, most notably as he researched the ill-fated “Star Wars” missile defense system of the Cold War era.
A Shared Passion for Justice and Equality
Today, Kris is the Watershed Ecologist with the Huron River Watershed Council, where she has worked since 1992. The Huron River Watershed Council works with businesses, local agencies, and the community to protect the river and its environment through education, scientific research, and monitoring. Thanks in large part to the Council's work, the Huron River is the cleanest in Southeast Michigan.
In addition to her work as a steward of the local environment, Kris supports the ACLU out of her concern surrounding free speech issues, religious liberty, and the role we play as a watchdog looking out to protect all of our constitutional and civil rights. She enjoys seeing our cases covered in the media as a regular reminder that the ACLU is doing the daily work that others do not have the time for.
David is a professor of Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure at the University of Michigan Law School and an appellate criminal defense attorney. David has also cooperated on a number of important ACLU cases, including Spencer v. Bay City, where a local ordinance forcing underage pedestrians to take a breathalyzer test without a search warrant was struck down as unconstitutional.
David acknowledges this as his most gratifying experience as an ACLU supporter, having learned a great deal about trial practice and conducting a deposition, and cites criminal justice and procedure as his primary ACLU interests.
Additionally, David is the director of University of Michigan Law School’s Innocence Clinic, which he founded with current Michigan Supreme Court Justice Bridget McCormack. Students at the Michigan Innocence Clinic investigate and litigate cases on behalf of prisoners who have new evidence that may establish that they are actually innocent of the crimes for which they have been convicted. In addition to ongoing litigation, the clinic has exonerated seven people since 2009.
David has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court six times, including a favorable ruling in the ACLU case, Halbert v. Michigan, involving the right to counsel on appeal. He won another Supreme Court case this February in Evans v. Michigan.
Legal Director Michael J. Steinberg sums up David’s commitment by saying, “David is one of the finest attorneys with whom I’ve had the opportunity to work. He is our ‘go-to’ attorney on all criminal procedure issues and all in all cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. There is nobody in this country more committed to civil liberties and justice.”
The ACLU of Michigan is grateful to David and Kris for their longtime and significant support, through their generous giving and their hard work, which seems to have only increased over time.
