AttorneysEd Center

Lara Bazelon is an associate professor of law and the director of the Criminal Juvenile Justice and Racial Justice Clinical Programs at the University of San Francisco School of Law. From 2012-2015, she was a visiting associate clinical professor at Loyola Law School and the director of the Loyola Law School Project for the Innocent. Professor Bazelon was a trial attorney in the Office of the Federal Public Defender in Los Angeles for seven years. Prior to that, she was a law clerk for the Honorable Harry Pregerson on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Professor Bazelon’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of ethics and criminal justice advocacy. She is the co-chair of the American Bar Association’s Ethics, Gideon & Professionalism Committee, where she has organized roundtables at law schools across the country to develop and revise ethical standards for judges, prosecutors, and defense attorneys in the areas of mental health and forensic science. In January 2017, she was selected to serve a three-year term on the American Bar Association’s Criminal Justice Council. Professor Bazelon is a contributing writer for Slate and Politico Magazine, where her long-form journalism and opinion pieces appear regularly, including a long-running series in Slate on issues arising from wrongful convictions. Her essays and op-eds have also been published in the New York Times, Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Fusion, and Los Angeles Times. Professor Bazelon’s book about wrongful convictions and restorative justice will be published in 2018. She is the recipient of a writer-in-residency award from the MacDowell Colony in 2016 and from Mesa Refuge in 2017, where she was named a Langeloth Fellow for excellence in writing about issues relating to the criminal justice system. She is a non-resident senior fellow at Brandeis University’s Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism.

Professor Bazelon’s book: Rectify: The Power of Restorative Justice After Wrongful Conviction (Beacon Press) is currently available for pre-order at a number of online book sellers, including Amazon.

Please go to her website: www.larabazelon.com to learn more about Rectify.

Synopsis: In the courtroom, there are always—and only— two irreconcilable sides of the same story. Black/white. Right/wrong. Feller/fallen. When the wrong story prevails, justice is perverted and an innocent person is condemned. When there is an exoneration, expect a happy ending. But an exoneration is an earthquake that leaves behind upheaval and ruin. Is there a way forward?

EducationBA, Columbia UniversityJD, New York University ExperienceVisiting Associate Clinical Professor, Loyola Law SchoolDirector, Loyola Law School Project for the InnocentClinical Fellow, UC Hastings College of the LawDeputy Federal Public Defender, Los AngelesLaw Clerk, Honorable Harry Pregerson