Michael K. Molitor

I teach Business Organizations, Secured Transactions, Securities Regulation, Wills, Estates and Trusts, and a new course about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. I am also the director of the Corporate Law and Finance LL.M. program, and Acting General Counsel. I do a great deal of work with the Business Law Section of the Michigan state bar.

Before joining Cooley Law School, I was an attorney with the Grand Rapids, Michigan, law firm of Warner Norcross & Judd L.L.P. from 1994 to 2004. While in private practice, I focused on business and securities law, counseling a variety of clients including publicly traded corporations, closely held corporations, and controlling shareholders. I have also served as a legal intern in the Washtenaw County Prosecutor's Office and as a student attorney in The Free Legal Aid Clinic., Inc., of Detroit.

In law school, I was a member of the Order of the Coif; served as assistant editor, then editor-in-chief, of The Wayne Law Review ; won American Jurisprudence Awards in Constitutional Law II, Conflicts of Law, and Civil Procedure; and was the recipient of the Bronze Key Award.

I have written two textbooks, have written a chapter in ICLE's Michigan Contract Law, and have been published in several law reviews.

I am a member of the Council of the Business Law Section of the state bar of Michigan and Vice-Chair of the Corporate Laws Committee, which periodically recommends statutory changes to the Michigan legislature. 

You can view my LinkedIn profile HERE.

Articles (Law Reviews and Law Journals)

• Michael Molitor and Bruce Haffey, Shareholders’ Ability to Contractually Eliminate Oppression: The Uncertain Meaning of the Last Sentence of the Shareholder Oppression Statute, 40 Mich. Bus. L.J. 24 (2020).
• Michael K. Molitor, Fiduciary Duties of Officers and Managers: Some Open Questions Under Michigan Law, Mich. Bus. L.J. (Spring 2018).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 60 Wayne L. Rev. 837 (2015).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 56 Wayne L. Rev. 933 (2010).
• Michael K. Molitor, The Crucial Role of the Nominating Committee: Re-Inventing Nominating Committees in the Aftermath of Shareholder Access to the Proxy, 11 U.C. Davis Bus. L.J. 97 (2010).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 56 Wayne L. Rev. 131 (2010).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 55 Wayne L. Rev. 81 (2009).
• Michael K. Molitor, Eat Your Vegetables (Or At Least Understand Why You Should): Can Better Warning and Education of Prospective Minority Owners Reduce Oppression in Closely Held Businesses?, 15 Fordham J. Corp. & Fin. Law 491 (2009).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 54 Wayne L. Rev. 27 (2008).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Associations, 53 Wayne L. Rev. 113 (2007).
• Michael K. Molitor, Will More Sunlight Fade the Pink Sheets? Increasing Public Information About Non-Reporting Issuers with Quoted Securities, 39 Ind. L. Rev. 309 (2006).
• Daniel Gravelyn, Kevin G. Dougherty, Melvin G. Moseley, Jr., Shaun M. Murphy, & Michael K. Molitor, Criminal Procedure: Annual Survey of Michigan Law, 42 Wayne L. Rev. 627 (1996).
• Michael K. Molitor, Employment and Labor Law: Annual Survey of Michigan Law, 41 Wayne L. Rev. 763 (1995).
• Michael K. Molitor, Note, The Battered Child Syndrome as Self-Defense Evidence in Parricide Cases, 40 Wayne L. Rev. 237 (1993).

Books and Chapters in Books

• Molitor, Michael K (with Frank C. Aiello). Secured Transactions: Statutes, Problems, and Cases (Vandeplas 2018).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Organizations: Statutes, Problems, and Cases, 2d ed. (Vandeplas 2016). 
• Michael K. Molitor, “Performance, Conditions, Breach, and Excused Nonperformance,” in Michigan Contract Law, 2d ed., edited by John R. Trentacosta, 339-420 (Inst. of Continuing Legal Educ. 2013).
• Molitor, Michael K. “Performance, Breach and Excused Nonperformance,” in Michigan Contract Law, edited  by John R. Trentacosta, 12-1 - 12-58 (Inst. of Continuing Legal Educ. Supp. 2008).
• Michael K. Molitor, Business Organizations: Statutes, Problems and Cases (Vandeplas 2011).
• Molitor, Michael K. “Performance, Breach and Excused Nonperformance,” in Michigan Contract Law, edited  by John R. Trentacosta, 12-1 - 12-56 (Inst. of Continuing Legal Educ. Supp. 2005).
• Molitor, Michael K. "Performance, Breach and Excused Nonperformance," in Michigan Contract Law, edited by John R. Trentacosta, 12-1 - 12-71 (Inst. of Continuing Legal Edu. 1998).

Short Works

• Hugh H. Makens & Michael Molitor, "Due Diligence In Private Placements – Checklists,"  in Regulation D Offerings and Private Placements, 491-506 (ALI-ABA 2008). 
• Hugh H. Makens & Michael Molitor, "Due Diligence In Private Placements – Checklists," in Regulation D Offerings and Private Placements, 161-176 (ALI-ABA 2007).
• Michael K. Molitor, Mending SOX: Is Some Relief from the Sarbanes-Oxley Act Coming for Smaller Public Companies?, 26 Mich. Bus. L. J. Spring 2006 at 42. 
• Michael K. Molitor, Some Planning Ideas to Resolve Deadlocks in Closely Held Corporations, 22 Mich. Bus. L. J. Spring 2002 at 14.