Emily Osika is a senior, majoring in international relations and minoring in political economy in the James Madison
College at Michigan State University. She was the first recipient of the Center for Anti-Counterfeiting and Product
Protection’s Matthew Ronald Maher Scholarship in 2018-2019 and is going into her fifth semester researching as an
A-CAPP Center intern. During the summer of 2019, Emily interned at the Economic Policy Research Institute (EPRI),
which is a non-for-profit and international-based research institute located in Cape Town, South Africa. She
participated in qualitative data analysis involving the implementation and evaluation of social protection programs
across the global south. She will be graduating in December of 2019.
Erin L. Bunting is an assistant professor and director of Remote Sensing and GIS Research and Outreach Services
(RS&GIS) at Michigan State University. She has more than a decade of experience in geospatial applications including
an extensive research and teaching portfolio. Erin’s research background is broad including remote sensing, time series
statistic development, GIS, climatology, and ecology/environmental science. During her career, she has conducted
extensive fieldwork/field experiments across southern Africa, South America, the southeastern U.S., and the
southwestern U.S. Erin has taught courses on taught Introduction to introductory and advanced remote sensing, GIS,
and GIS in research at the university level and with practitioners/land managers. As director of RS&GIS, Erin oversees
all projects for the developer and analyst teams and also works on project development and outreach activities.
RS&GIS provides geospatial technology services and training to research faculty, state/federal governments,
municipalities, nonprofits, and the private sector. Comprised of a diverse professional staff, RS&GIS maintains over a
century of combined expertise in the areas of GIS, remote sensing (RS), global positioning systems (GPS), application
development, cartography and graphic design.
Greg Leimone is the North America regional security manager at Syngenta, a global agriculture company and a leader
in crop protection products and seeds based in Basel, Switzerland. Among other responsibilities, the team drives the
brand protection effort and investigations for counterfeit, theft, diversion and illicit trade of Syngenta products
throughout the United States and Canada. In the heavily regulated market of pesticides, partnering with local, state, &
federal law enforcement and government agencies is key. His team is currently leading a complex transnational
investigation of counterfeit Syngenta products with a major presence on e-commerce platforms. Prior to Syngenta, Greg
had a diverse 20 years of experience inclusive of nine years as a sworn law enforcement officer, as an owner of a
successful security consulting and private investigations practice and prior work designing and selling intelligence &
critical incident management technologies and platforms to law enforcement and the military. Before entering the
security field, he worked for a global software company in human resources/employee relations and holds a bachelor of
arts in criminal justice. Greg is an active member of numerous organizations dedicated to security, intelligence, threat
assessment and risk management. Greg has been interviewed, cited and requested to speak on many different topics
ranging from security culture, investigations, workplace violence, active shooter response and counterfeit/brand
protection, among others. Greg lives in North Carolina where he enjoys spending time with family and being an assistant
coach of his 11-year-old son’s travel baseball team.
Jade Sims is a trade specialist at the Michigan State University International Business Center (MSU-CIBER) and is
involved in efforts to connect the Mid-Michigan business community with the resources of the MSU-CIBER and the
Broad College of Business. This work is strongly export-focused and includes programs such as the Global Business Club
of Mid-Michigan, the Michigan Export Growth Program, and also also organizes tailored programs to develop
international strategies and create export plans. In addition, Jade is involved with study abroad programs, currently
leading an undergraduate program to Spain each spring. Prior to joining MSU Jade taught Spanish language, business
Spanish and advised undergraduate students in the College of Arts & Letters at MSU. Prior to coming to MSU, she
worked for over two years overseeing new product launch in the automotive industry and served as a microenterprise
consultant with the Peace Corps. Jade is on the editorial board of the A-CAPP Center’s The Brand Protection
Professional. Jade holds a bachelor of arts in business and spanish from Alma College and an master of business in
international management with a specialization in global policy and development from Thunderbird School of Global
Management and is a certified global business professional and trainer.
James (Jim) Cunningham is currently Deputy Director, Global IP Enforcement and Security for Alibaba. Prior to joining
Alibaba in December 2016, James was a supervisory special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) where
he served as the supervisor of a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) squad in New York City. While at the FBI, Jim
conducted both criminal and counter-terrorism investigations. These investigations included a variety of domestic and
international crimes including intellectual property rights violations, counterfeiting, financial crimes, smuggling, fraud,
organized crime, narcotics and weapons trafficking, and terrorist bombings. During his intellectual property rights
investigations, he focused on the counterfeiting and diversion of pharmaceuticals and opiates. As a Special Agent
Bomb Technician, Jim was trained to locate and disable bombs and respond to the threats of hazardous materials such
as chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. His investigations and training took him overseas on numerous occasions
both in support of operations and as an instructor. Prior to his career at the FBI, he was an engineer and procurement
manager at an international power company.
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