2013-2014 Luce Scholar

Placement: Law Reform Commission of Thailand, Bangkok, Thailand



Henry Ross was a Morehead-Cain Scholar at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In May 2013, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in Classics and a minor in Biology. Henry’s international, academic, and extracurricular background has fueled his commitment to the improvement of trial advocacy and due process through comparative legal theory. Raised in Italy and Switzerland, Henry has taught third grade in rural Zimbabwe, conducted legal research as a summer analyst for an international investment firm, and traveled to Cape Town on a research grant to study South African criminal procedure under the apartheid regime. He has witnessed directly both the tyranny of the law—to impoverish, enrich, and immure—and the opportunity for great leaders to direct it toward justice. Henry’s coursework has combined the study of personal narrative, legal framework, and objective knowledge that he considers crucial to criminal law. He has pursued independent and graduate-level studies in ancient Greek and Latin since his sophomore year, culminating in his receipt of the department’s top undergraduate award for Greek studies and an Honors Thesis on narrative perspective in Vergil’s Georgics. Henry has supplemented Classics with significant work in constitutional law, criminal law, chemistry, and upper-level biology. Since 2009, Henry has served as a counsel in UNC’s student-run honor system, progressing from handling cases of minor plagiarism to arguing some of the University’s most serious sexual assault cases. Henry has completed a comparative study with the Chair of the Faculty on policy and procedure in the disciplinary systems of UNC’s peer institutions, spearheaded a faculty outreach initiative, and designed a novel data collection system expected to vastly improve the system’s transparency and fairness. He served the University as the deputy student attorney general and solicitor general for the student body. Last summer, he worked as an investigator for the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia gathering oral and written evidence for indigent defendants accused of Felony 1 crimes. On the side, Henry remains active on the UNC Squash Team, which he captained for the 2011-2012 season. He relies on music, friends, and family for guidance and inspiration.

The Law Reform Commission of Thailand (LCRT) is an independent, publicly-funded commission solely dedicated to legal reforms and developments in Thailand. Its statutory footing as an independent body was given under the auspices of the Office of the Council of State of Thailand. The Commission’s chief responsibilities are to provide independent legislative advice on potential areas of law that are in need of urgent reform as well as canvassing general public opinions through consultation.