Criminal

This fall, the Harvard Law School Library hosted a series of book talks by HLS authors, with topics ranging from Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts to a Citizen's Guide to Impeachment. As part of this ongoing series, faculty authors from various disciplines shared their research and discussed their recently published books.

Managing Director of the Cyberlaw Clinic Professor Chris Bavitz discusses some of the concerns and opportunities of risk assessment tools for criminal justice reform efforts, and the Berkman Klein Center's work on Ethics and Governance of AI initiative in partnership with the MIT Media Lab.

Julian SpearChief-Morris ’17 is the first indigenous student to lead the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, marking his place in the storied history of the bureau which was founded in 1913 to provide legal services to low-income clients in the Boston area.

As part of Harvard Law School's bicentennial summit, a panel, “Special Prosecutors and Independent Counsels: Investigating the White House and the President of the United States,” gathered six Harvard alumni and faculty members who’ve been involved with nearly every high-profile investigation, from Watergate to Whitewater, to the leaking of Valerie Plame’s identity.

Each year, as we honor military veterans nationwide for their service, Harvard Law Today profiles students in the incoming class who have held positions in the Armed Forces. The Class of 2020 includes the largest number of former or current service members in Harvard Law's recent history.

In many ways, Jane's life in Kenya was idyllic: She was an educated, confident professional woman with a flourishing career, raising a daughter whom she loved dearly. There was only one problem in her life: her husband, who had become increasingly violent and abusive in the privacy of their own home.

Over a year ago, a group of students in Harvard Law School's Criminal Justice Policy Program (CJPP) began working to propel forensic science reform in Massachusetts. On Oct. 2, the students' work culminated in a Wrongful Conviction Day event at the Massachusetts State House.

The Harvard Law Review has announced the launch of the Harvard Law Review Blog, a new platform created to encourage timely discussion of current legal issues, and to connect readers to today’s leading legal scholars and practitioners, providing regular expert analysis of recent legislation, the latest legal theories, and pending cases across the country.

Experts gathered at Harvard Law School on Oct. 10 to examine the potential for bias as our decision-making intelligence becomes ever more artificial at an event titled “Programing the Future of AI: Ethics, Governance, and Justice,” held at Wasserstein Hall as part of HUBweek, an annual citywide celebration of art, science, and technology.

HLS Professor of Practice Naz K. Modirzadeh ’02 gave a talk at a United Nations General Assembly event on Sept. 22 called, “International Humanitarian Law: Addressing violations in light of recent conflicts,” which focused on failures of international law to protect health care systems in armed conflict in Syria involving designated terrorists.

The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race & Justice at Harvard Law School joined forces with the ACLU of Massachusetts to host a daylong conference at Harvard Law School in June, titled “Redefining the Role of the Prosecutor within the Community.”

In an interview with the Harvard Gazette, cybersecurity expert Bruce Schneier, a fellow with the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society and the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard Kennedy School, talked about government and corporate surveillance, and about what concerned users can do to protect their privacy.

In early 2014, Alec Karakatsansis, ’08, used some of the money that he and a Harvard Law School classmate had recently received from the school’s Public Service Venture Fund seed grant to buy a plane ticket to Birmingham, Alabama, and rent a car.

Alex Spiro '08 has emerged in short order as the go-to lawyer for professional basketball players who get in trouble with the law in New York--just one slice of Spiro’s clientele, summarized by sports and culture website The Ringer as “the rich, the famous, and the restless.”

Drawing on his interests in constitutional law, constitutional history, and racial equality, Professor Michael Klarman’s Last Lecture explored the obstacles faced — and in many ways, overcome — by feminist lawyers and African-American civil rights lawyers in the middle of the last century.

A sharp increase in web encryption and a worldwide shift away from standalone websites in favor of social media and online publishing platforms has altered the practice of state-level internet censorship and in some cases led to broader crackdowns, a new study by the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University finds.

In May 2017, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court extended the American with Disabilities Act to mentally and physically disabled prisoners seeking parole, ruling that the state must help them get support systems in place in the community—thanks to years of work by students with Harvard's Prison Legal Assistance Project.

In January, it was as if the U.S. Supreme Court were playing host to a tournament of champions for past winners of the Ames Moot Court Competition, with three attorneys who argued Midland Funding, LLC v. Johnson having been on teams that won the competition within four years of each other at Harvard Law School.

Nancy Gertner, a retired federal judge in Massachusetts who is now a senior lecturer at Harvard Law School, spoke with the Gazette about the legal issues swirling around President Donald Trump and FBI Director James Comey's testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee.

On May 18, on behalf of affected Colombian communities, a coalition of human rights groups including the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School called on the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate the complicity of executives at Chiquita Brands International in crimes against humanity.

For Trenton Van Oss ’17, coming to Harvard Law School meant adapting to a different culture and experience as a student who had been educated at Christian schools, and whose strong allegiance to the GOP put him in a distinct minority at a secular school with a predominantly liberal student body and faculty.