Criminal Law and Procedure

HLS Alexandra Natapoff argues in her revised book that snitching undermines justice and recommends what we should do about it. 

With support from PSVF and Wasserstein fellowships, Mercedes Montagnes ’09, founder of the Promise of Justice Initiative, has tackled injustices in the Louisiana carceral system.

Anna Lvovsky ’13 has been promoted to professor of law at Harvard Law School. A scholar of criminal law and procedure, constitutional law, and evidence, she joined the faculty as an assistant professor in 2017.

In the first of the series, “Cases in Brief,” Harvard Law Professor Dehlia Umunna discusses the infamous “Scottsboro Boys” case, Powell v. Alabama (1932), in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled for the first time that defendants in capital cases have the right to adequate legal counsel.

Amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Alex Whiting, deputy specialist prosecutor at the Kosovo Specialist Prosecutor’s Office in The Hague, outlines the path from investigation to trial, and ultimately to justice.

For the past two years, students in Harvard’s Prison Legal Assistance Project have helped prisoners they say were targeted for retaliatory violence.

HLS Professor Andrew Crespo was one of 59 members elected to the American Law Institute this year. Thirteen Harvard Law School alumni were also elected.

“This administration needs to get out of its own way, … take action where it can, and create pathways for others to take action where it cannot or will not,” says Premal Dharia, executive director of the Institute to End Mass Incarceration.

In a case that could have national implications, the Harvard Law School Crimmigration Clinic recently convinced judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to discredit the use of controversial municipal gang databases in immigration proceedings.

In “Civil Rights Queen: Constance Baker Motley and the Struggle for Equality,” Harvard Law Professor Tomiko Brown-Nagin traces the tactics of the groundbreaking lawyer amid pivotal protests.

Described as one of the great figures in the history of Harvard Law School, Lloyd L. Weinreb ’62, a leading authority on criminal and copyright law, and an HLS professor for nearly a half-century, died Dec. 15, at the age of 85.

When asked what he wanted to be remembered by, longtime Harvard Law Professor and former Watergate prosecutor Philip B. Heymann ’60 replied: “Speaking truth to power.” Heymann, a beloved colleague and distinguished public servant, died Nov. 30 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 89.

Retired federal judge Nancy Gertner, now a senior lecturer on law at Harvard Law School, talks about the verdicts in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, how the trial was conducted, and comparisons to the ongoing trial of the men who killed Ahmaud Arbery.

Harvard Law student Michael Chang-Frieden ’23 discusses writing a global watchdog report on Japan’s ability to fight money laundering, terrorist financing, and nuclear proliferation financing.

Professor Intisar Rabb, director of the Program in Islamic Law at Harvard Law School, was appointed as a special adviser on Islamic Law to the new chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.

Former legal adviser to the National Security Council during the Bush administration says 20 years after 9/11, he's frustrated there hasn't been more progress toward an international legal framework for dealing with terrorism.

A counterterrorism czar in the Bush administration, and the first-ever assistant secretary of the Treasury for terrorist financing and financial crimes, says the U.S. needs to reconceptualize what power means in the 21st century.

Twenty years after the 9/11 attacks, a former California congresswoman and ranking member of House Intelligence Committee reflects on events of that day and the calamities we still confront.

On the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Harvard Law Today asked five Harvard Law School alumni and a former adjunct professor, all of whom had prominent roles in counterterrorism and other national policies during and after 9/11, to share their reflections about the events of that day.

The former head of Homeland Security and co-author of the USA Patriot Act says the U.S. needs a strategy for dislodging terrorist groups.

A co-author of the 9/11 Commission report, who served on the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, says engaged citizenry united in its efforts will make this country safer.

Each year, half of HLS’ first-year J.D. students and around a quarter of LL.M. students participate in at least one of HLS' 11 Student Practice Organizations, with some involved in multiple organizations at once.

This academic year, 14 Wasserstein Public Interest Fellows have been named at Harvard Law School.

“Anna Lvovsky chronicles the policing of gay life in the mid-20th century.

Merrick Garland ’77 made the unusual choice to leave a lifetime appointment on the nation’s second most influential court to instead lead a federal agency with roughly 115,000 employees. Unusual, but not surprising, say those who know him well.

Andrew Manuel Crespo ’08 and Premal Dharia, leaders of the ambitious new Institute to End Mass Incarceration, take aim at ‘one of the defining civil rights issues of our time.’

From the battles of Lev Gleason to a Civil War battle that changed a nation

A Harvard Law School clinic works to overturn a federal policy in D.C. that advocates say leads to racial injustice and contributes to mass incarceration.

Nora McDonnell ’21 is the inaugural winner of the Kristin P. Muniz Memorial Award.

The Last Lecture Series at Harvard Law School, sponsored annually by the 3L and LL.M. class marshals, is an HLS tradition in which selected faculty members impart insight, advice, and final words of wisdom to the graduating class.

Premal Dharia of Harvard Law School’s Institute to End Mass Incarceration testified before the House of Representatives Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security on reforming the pretrial process as a way to reduce the injustices she says plague the criminal justice system.

A panel of Harvard Law professors discussed the guilty verdict in the Derek Chauvin trial, which proved an occasion for cautious optimism, a bit of anxiety, and questions about what comes next.

Virtual film premiere and panel discussion of new documentary inspired by HLS Professor Alexandra Natapoff’s book, “Punishment Without Crime.”

Three Harvard Law School professors have teamed up with MIT Press to launch a new journal focused on issues of inequality.

Since President Joe Biden took office in January, dozens of Harvard Law community members, including faculty and alumni, have been tapped to serve in high-profile positions in his administration

Experts discuss the myriad ways money and wealth influence criminal processes and outcomes as part of the yearlong "Policing in America" colloquium series, led by Harvard Law Professors Alexandra Natapoff and Andrew Manuel Crespo.

Premal Dharia, founder and director of the Defender Impact Initiative, is joining Harvard Law School as the inaugural executive director of the Institute to End Mass Incarceration.

Reporter Lincoln Miller, 11, interviews Laurence Tribe ’66 on the Capitol riots and impeachment for his story in Scholastic Kids Press.

Harvard Law Professor Alexandra Natapoff is an award-winning legal scholar and criminal justice expert.

Harvard Law Visiting Professor Sanford Levinson puts the storming of the Capitol in historical perspective.

Harvard Law School’s James Tierney says police would have treated Black Lives Matter protesters differently.

Christopher Lewis, a political philosopher and scholar of the criminal legal system, has been named an assistant professor of law at Harvard Law School, effective Jan. 1.

The Harvard Law School Library's Nuremberg Trials Project has been used by students, academics, filmmakers and artists among others to support their work in the retelling and documentation of World War II and the atrocities committed during that time.

In recent court victory, students from the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program help safeguard the lives of countless asylum seekers by preventing more stringent federal immigration rules from going into effect.

HLS faculty on COVID-19 and the pressing questions of racism, racial injustice, and abuse of power that have driven this difficult year—and that are the focus of three new lecture series at the school.

Professor Jim Greiner at the Access to Justice Lab is aiming to find out whether the practice of law can be transformed by using evidence to determine which legal interventions are safe and effective, both for individuals in the justice system and society as a whole.