John A. C. Cartner

Biography of John A C Cartner

John A. C. Cartner graduated from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in 1969 and immediately went to sea as a young third officer on ammunition ships and tank ships in the Viet Nam war zone. He continued sailing, rising in licensure level and began graduate school at the University of Georgia where he financed the M.Sc. and Ph.D. studies by sailing four months a year in the summers while reading independently and performing naval reserve Active Duty for Training during Decembers for two weeks. He was appointed to his first command, a tank ship, the same year he received his doctoral degree. His post-doctoral work was with the U.S. Army Research Institute where he devised mathematical models of tactical weapons systems performances as a soldier-weapon system. During the post-doctoral work he received the M.B.A. degree from the Georgia Institute of Technology/Georgia State University program.

He worked briefly for the Grumman Corporation in ship handling modeling and then established a naval architecture-marine engineering consultancy in Washington, D.C. where among other projects was the pollution response to the Exxon Valdez oil spill under contract to the U.S. Navy.

Leaving that company he went to law school at the Catholic university of America and the University of Maryland Thurgood Marshall School of Law and later received the LL.M. degree from the Thomas Jefferson School of Law in international law. He is a fellow of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (U.S.), the Royal Institution of Naval Architects (U.K.) and the Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology (U.K.). he is a Chartered Engineer in naval architecture (U.K.). He is a member of the District of Columbia Bar Association and the Law Society of England and Wales and is designated a Proctor in Admiralty by the Maritime Law Association of the united States. He is a member of the Canadian, South African and Australian-New Zealand maritime law associations.

He has been a regular columnist for Lloyds List, Piracy Daily and other maritime publications and is a regular member and contributor to the quarterly journal of the Council of American Master Mariners. He has tried cases in the admiralty jurisdiction in state and federal courts and has argued before a state supreme court in admiralty and has had cases published. He has served various courts as an expert in maritime matters and has published various learned articles in law and engineering journals. He has published two books on maritime matters and has a chapter in another book and has a co-authored book on human rights in press. The second edition of The International law of the Shipmaster will be published in 2014under the title Cartner on the International Law of the Shipmaster. He currently practices law in Washington, D.C. concentrating on matters of piracy, mutiny and barratry and the law of naval architecture and marine engineering.

His avocations include sailing Cape Cod catboats and ancient Greek literature. He is married with four adult children and commutes from his home in Beaufort, N.C., USA to Washington DC in his airplane. He is a member of the New York Yacht Club and the Cosmos Club of Washington, D.C., a director of the Friends of the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort and the founder of The Beaufort Coalition for the Arts. He is an Episcopalian and member of St. Paul's Church in Beaufort.