The Cleveland Academy of Trial Attorneys is pleased to welcome Susan Saladoff as the keynote speaker at The Annual Meeting & Awards Dinner on June 22, 2012.
Susan Saladoff is the Producer/Director of the documentary film Hot Coffee. She spent 25 years practicing law in the civil justice system, representing injured victims of individual and corporate negligence. She stopped practicing law in 2009 to make the documentary, her first feature-length film, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, and had its broadcast premiere on HBO in June 2011. Hot Coffee and Susan have received many awards since the film’s debut, including the Grand Jury Prize Best Documentary 2011 Seattle International Film Festival, Best Documentary at the Tampa and Albuquerque Film Festivals, and the award for the Documentary Every American Should See 2011 Traverse City Film Fest (Michael Moore’s Film Festival). Most recently, Hot Coffee received the 2012 TV Academy Honors award given by the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (which gives the Emmy awards) celebrating “Television with a Conscience” – for shows that inspire, inform, motivate, and even have the power to change lives.
The power of Hot Coffee lies in its ability to add a fresh perspective to a debate that has been fiercely one-sided for the past two decades. Since its premiere at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, Hot Coffee has screened at dozens of film festivals across the U.S. and the world, and has been broadcast in many countries, including Israel, Japan, Denmark and Venezuela. Susan is currently on tour with the film, going state by state, screening at local movie theaters, law schools, universities, churches and community events, encouraging people to take action to protect our rights to access the courts.