LLM Profile: Lt. Col. Chuck Killion

Lieutenant Colonel Charles Curtis Killion, LL.M. ’00, is currently the Chief of Environmental Law for Headquarters Air Force Space Command, Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado. Following graduation from the LL.M. program, Lt Col Killion was assigned to the Air Force Environmental Law and Litigation Division in Arlington, Virginia, where he spent his first year as the Air Force approval authority for environmental tort claims. He then spent a one-year tour in the Department of Justice Environmental Defense Section as a trial attorney on Air Force and Department of Defense cases. Post-DOJ, as the head of the Airspace and Range Litigation branch, he was appointed as a Special Assistant United States Attorney and defended primarily NEPA and ESA cases impacting the Air Force’s flying and training operations. He successfully defended an appeal in Lee v. United States Air Force, 354 F.3d 1229 (10th Cir. N.M. 2004). In summer 2003 he moved to Headquarters Air Force Space Command where he is chief of the environmental law division, providing advice to environmental attorneys at eight Air Force bases in all areas of environmental law related to base operations, space and missile launches, and satellite operations.