California Western --
Justin P. Brooks                                                           Justin Brooks

Executive Director, Institute for Criminal Defense Advocacy
Institute Professor
Director, LL.M. in Trial Advocacy
Project Director, California Innocence Project 

LL.M. Georgetown University [advocacy]
J.D. American University
B.B.A. Temple University [business law]

Courses Taught:  California Innocence Project I & II, Comparative & International Criminal Procedure, LL.M. Federal Criminal Practice, LL.M. Federal Sentencing, Criminal Procedure and Criminal Law, Wrongful Convictions Seminar

Professor Justin Brooks is the Director of California Innocence Project, the Institute for Criminal Defense Advocacy, and California Western's LL.M. in Trial Advocacy Specializing in Federal Criminal Law.  Prior to coming to California, Professor Brooks practiced as a criminal defense attorney in Washington D.C., Michigan, and Illinois.  Over the course of his career he has served as counsel on several high profile criminal cases and has been successful in exonerating wrongfully convicted clients.  He has been recognized several times by the Los Angeles Daily Journal as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in California.  In 2010, California Lawyer Magazine awarded him the prestigious "Lawyer of the Year" award.

Professor Brooks began his teaching career as a Fellow at Georgetown Law Center in 1990.  He continued to teach at Georgetown after his fellowship ended and served as Associate Director of Georgetown’s Corrections Clinic.  In 1993, he began teaching at Thomas M. Cooley Law School where he taught criminal law, criminal procedure, death penalty law, and law and literature.  He directed the moot court program, coached the law school’s first National Championship moot court team, and supervised a death penalty clinical program.  

In 1999, Professor Brooks moved to California and founded California Innocence Project at California Western School of Law with Professor Jan Stiglitz.  The project is an in-house law school clinic that investigates and litigates cases of factual innocence while training law students to be ethical, justice-driven advocates.  The project has been successful in exonerating many wrongfully convicted clients and has been recognized with several awards, as well as local, national, and international media attention.

Professor Brooks has been involved in training lawyers throughout his career.  As Director of the Institute for Criminal Defense Advocacy, he has run an annual trial skills academy for new lawyers for more than a decade.  As Director of the LL.M. in trial Advocacy, he oversees a program dedicated to training lawyers for practice in federal court.  He has also been very involved in training Latin American lawyers.  He founded the only trial skills academy in the country conducted in Spanish and he travels around Latin America training attorneys, judges, and law enforcement agents on trial skills and criminal forensics. 

Professor Brooks has published extensively in the areas of criminal law, clinical education, and habeas litigation.  He is the author of the only legal casebook devoted to the topic of wrongful convictions.

Selected Publications

  • Wrongful Convictions: Cases and Materials, Vandeplas Publishing LLC (1st ed. 2011).
  • "Find the Cost of Freedom: The Struggle to Compensate the Innocent for Wrongful Incarceration and the Strange Legal Odyssey of Timothy Atkins," 49 San Diego Law Review 3 (co-authored with Simpson) (2012).
  • "Blood Sugar Sex Magik: A Review of Postconviction DNA Testing Statutes and Legislative Recommendations," 59 Drake Law Review 799 (co-authored with Simpson) (2011).
  • "The Hurricane Meets the Paper Chase: Innocence Projects New Emerging Role in Clinical Legal Education," 38 California Western Law Review 413 (co-authored with Stiglitz & Shulman) (2002).
  • "The Politics of Prisons," 77 Michigan Bar Journal 154 (1998).
  • "Will Boys Just be "Boyz N the Hood"? African-American Directors Portray a Crumbling Justice System in Urban America," 22 Oklahoma City University Law Review 1 (1997).
  • "Justice For Sale: Is a Death Row Inmate Entitled to Discovery After the Judge Who Presided at Trial is Convicted of Taking Bribes to Fix Cases," 7 Preview of United States Supreme Court Cases 433 (1997).
  • "How Can We Sleep While the Beds Are Burning? The Tumultuous Prison Culture of Attica Flourishes in American Prisons Twenty-Five Years Later," 45 Syracuse Law Review 159 (1996).  Reprinted in Prisoners and the Law (Ira Robbins).
  • "The Dire Wolf Collects his Due While the Boys Sit by the Fire: Michigan Cannot Afford to Buy into the Death Penalty," 13 Thomas M. Cooley Law Review 877 (co-authored with Erickson) (1996).

Class Webpages

Links

 

Professor Brooks' Media Appearances - 2005, 2006, 2007

 

jbrooks@cwsl.edu      
619-525-7079
350 Cedar Street
San Diego, CA 92101 

Publications

Class Webpages

Links

Listen to Prof. Brooks on the CWSL Podcast