Viet Dinh

Viet Dinh, 38, is described in a biographical note as "professor of law and director of the Asian Law and Policy Studies Program at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C." 

Born on February 22, 1968, in Saigon, Vietnam, Dinh came to America as a refugee in 1978.

"After law school, where he was a class marshal and an Olin research fellow in law and economics, Professor Dinh served as a law clerk to Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. He also served as counsel to the Special Master mediating a number of lawsuits by Holocaust victims against German and Austrian financial institutions. Most recently, Professor Dinh served as Assistant Attorney General for Legal Policy in the U.S. Department of Justice," the biographical note released by News Corporation states.

In a media release announcing his appointment to the board of News Corporation in April 2004, the company chairman and chief executive Rupert Murdoch stated "Viet Dinh has had a remarkable career that has earned him the respect and admiration of legal scholars, politicians and business leaders. Having arrived in America as a Vietnamese refugee at age 10, Viet's academic brilliance and sheer hard work have propelled him to the very top of his field. His work as a key advisor to the Bush Administration in the war on terror has been invaluable to the security of the American people." 

While the News Corporation news release has much in common with the biographical profile of Dinh on the Department of Justice website, there was a notable omission. "He served as Associate Special Counsel to the U.S. Senate Whitewater Committee, as Special Counsel to Senator Pete V. Domenici for the Impeachment Trial of the President," the DoJ website profile stated. 

"As an academic, he specialized in constitutional law, corporations law, and the law and economics of development," it stated.

Some of his published work includes:
 * "Reassessing the Law of Preemption", Georgetown Law Journal, Volume 88 Number 2085, 2000;
 * "What Is the Law in Law and Development?", The Green Bag, Volume 3 Number 19, 1999;
 * "Codetermination and Corporate Governance in a Multinational Business Enterprise", Journal of Corporate Law, Volume 24 Number 975, 1999.
 * "Races, Crime, and the Law", Harvard Law Review, Volume 111 No 1289, 1988.

Following his appointment one media article decribed Dinh as "the primary author of the controversial Patriot Act I".