First-year law student Stewart Yerton, a former Star-Bulletin business writer, was selected as the inaugural “;Jarman Environmental Law Fellow,”; the William S. Richardson School of Law announced.

The fellowship is supported by an endowment started in 2005 by alumni and friends of the school's Environmental Law Program. It is named for ELP founder and law faculty member M. Casey Jarman to recognize her 22 years of public service and high teaching standards, the law school said.

A summer stipend is presented to a first-year student who seeks career development opportunities in the public interest or government sectors of environmental law.

Yerton will conduct legal research and write for the Honolulu-based nonprofit KAHEA: The Hawaiian-Environmental Alliance.

Yerton worked for the Star-Bulletin in 2005-06, then was a freelance journalist. He previously worked as a reporter in New York, Washington, D.C., New Orleans and Birmingham, Ala. He is a Columbia School of Journalism graduate.