Ms Karen Powell

Karen E. Powell is a Senior Lecturer of Tax and Clinical in Deakin Law School. Prior to Karen's academic appointment at Deakin Law School, she was appointed and served as the inaugural Forge Fellow in the Community Economic Development Law Clinic at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, a leader in experiential clinical education for lawyers. She has also taught at Ohio Northern University School of Law in the area of tax and business law. Her interest in teaching lies in developing a curriculum that provides both rigorous legal doctrinal training, as well as practical legal skills.  Karen has extensive training in various aspects of curriculum development in both lecture classes and experiential learning.

Before entry into academia, Karen was a practising attorney and litigator for over 15 years, including serving as an appointed tax judge, civil litigator, and executive manager for large regulatory institutions.  Appointed by the state Governor and confirmed by the Montana Senate, she served as Chairperson of the Montana Tax Appeal Board and managed state tax trials for over eight years. Having overseen hundreds of trials, and thousands of matters, her decisions have been consistently upheld by the Montana Supreme Court. She served as a substitute Justice of the Peace for Lewis and Clark County, and also served as an appointed Commissioner for the Uniform Law Commission; a national organization of appointed U.S. practising lawyers that promulgates a number of non-partisan, well-respected uniform laws including the Uniform Commercial Code, and international treaty recognition laws.  Prior to those appointments, Karen served as Montana’s Deputy Commissioner of Securities and Insurance, as well as litigating on behalf of the Montana Attorney General’s Office.

She is a certified mediator and has mediated civil cases on a pro bono basis for several years. She earned her Juris Doctorate from Stanford Law School and her B.A. from Wesleyan University.  She has been licensed to practice law in Montana, and the federal courts since 2001.

Karen is an entrepreneur as well as business attorney and litigator. She founded a successful craft distillery, which she built from the ground up and recently sold. She is also the co-owner of Blackstone Properties, a real estate company which owns, develops and manages substantial commercial and residential rental property.

In addition to a scholarly interest in teaching and learning within a law school context, Karen’s scholarly interests lie in analysing state, tribal and local regulatory and fiscal policy and its effects on emerging market structures.  She studies and writes on how legal doctrine, state tax structures and regulatory frameworks interact to shape an economic environment that either spurs or constricts certain highly regulated markets and its subsequent effect on consumer behaviour.