Statement from NYU President John Sexton
“I knew Kim since she was a first-year law student in my class. She was a person of manifest intelligence, energy, and charm; you simply knew that her future would be characterized by great achievement. From the first, I admired her, and we have been friends ever since.
“Though she went on to other things after graduation private practice, and clerking for a federal appeals court judge we drew her back to NYU. She worked in the Brennan Center, and later in my office. Her selection as the School of Law’s first Furman Fellow a highly selective program meant to provide a pathway for the finest young legal minds into academics reflected our confidence in her. My hope was that ultimately she would be a faculty member here at NYU. She was precisely the kind of person every institution of higher learning dreams of: brilliant, energetic, and so personally incandescent that she would burn her teaching onto the minds of all her students.
“I am deeply saddened by her death, not simply by the loss of someone I liked so much and regarded so highly, but by the sense of promise snatched away so senselessly. Her death is a loss to her family, our community, and higher education. I will miss her greatly. On behalf of the entire NYU community, I have offered my deepest sympathies to her family; I would ask that we all carry a kind and sympathetic thought for them in our hearts.”
Statement from NYU School of Law Dean Richard Revesz
“Kim truly was an extraordinary woman. Not only was she a gifted intellectual, but she was also a generous colleague and a devoted daughter, sister, aunt, and friend. Kim touched the lives of everyone she knew. Kim’s natural curiosity and effusiveness for life carried her around the world, infusing her work, her friendships, and her sensibility with a truly global outlook. Passionate and hard-working, Kim was deeply involved in issues of social justice and earned the deep respect and admiration of the countless people whose lives she touched. Her smile lit up a room, and her laughter was contagious. Kim’s indomitable spirit made her a joy to be around. She had a very bright future ahead of her, and promised to be an inspirational teacher and accomplished scholar. We will miss her terribly.
“Kim’s mother, Brenda Barry, her two sisters, Tracy and Tina, and many close friends have converged from far and wide to keep vigil with Kim at St. Vincent’s Hospital in these final days. I know that I speak for us all when I say that our thoughts are very much with Kim’s family and loved ones as they work through the grief of losing such an incredible young woman so tragically.