Eva S. Nilsen
Clinical Associate Professor of Law Emerita
BA, magna cum laude, Yale University
JD, University of Virginia Law School
LLM, Georgetown University Law Center
Biography
Professor Eva Nilsen has been a key member of the Criminal Justice Clinic’s faculty since 1979. Over the years, she has trained and supervised hundreds of third-year law students as they defend indigent clients in felony and misdemeanor cases. She also has taught criminal justice courses and seminars, including advanced criminal procedure, sentencing theory and a seminar based on U.S. drug policy.
“I never tire of my role as both an actor and critic in the criminal justice system,” she says. “Each semester, students are able to help clients who would not have received justice but for the students’ efforts. My research areas overlap closely with my teaching and representation of indigent defendants.”
Professor Nilsen has been a visiting professor at Pakistan’s University of Punjab Law College and at South Africa’s University of Witwatersrand, where she evaluated the law school’s clinical program and authored a report on legal education and curricular reform. Early in her career, she was an E. Barrett Prettyman Fellow at Georgetown University, where she tried criminal cases and supervised law students who represented indigent criminal defendants. Active in a number of professional associations, she now serves on the Board of Directors of the Suffolk County Lawyers for Justice.
Her current research and writing focuses on a critique of state and national drug policies. She has written a number of articles that have appeared in leading law journals including “Policing for Profit: The Drug War’s Hidden Economic Agenda,” “One Strike and You’re Out? Constitutional Constraints on Zero Tolerance in Public Education” and “How to Construct an Underclass, or How the War on Drugs Became a War on Education.”
- Profile Types
- Faculty and Professors Emeritus
Publications
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Eva Nilsen, From Harmelin to Graham - Justice Kennedy Stakes out a Path to Proportional Punishment 23 Federal Sentencing Reporter (2010)
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Eva Nilsen, Liberty Lost: The Moral Case for Marijuana Law Reform 85 Indiana Law Journal (2010)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, No Rational Basis: The Pragmatic Case for Marijuana Law Reform 17 Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law (2009)
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Eva Nilsen, Decency, Dignity, and Desert: Restoring Ideals of Humane Punishment to Constitutional Discourse 41 U.C. Davis Law Review (2007)
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Eva Nilsen, Symposium: The Role of the Judge in the Twenty-First Century: Introduction 86 Boston University Law Review (2006)
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Eva Nilsen, Indecent Standards: The Case of U.S. versus Weldon Angelos 11 Roger Williams University Law Review (2006)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, One Strike and You're Out? Constitutional Constraints on Zero Tolerance in Public Education 81 Washington University Law Quarterly (2003)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, How to Construct an Underclass, Or How the War on Drugs Became a War on Education 6 Journal of Gender, Race and Justice (2002)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, The Next Stage of Forfeiture Reform 14 Federal Sentencing Reporter (2001)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, Contesting Government's Financial Interest in Drug Cases 13 Criminal Justice (1999)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, Policing for Profit: The Drug War’s Hidden Economic Agenda 65 University of Chicago Law Review (1998)
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Eva Nilsen, The Criminal Defense Lawyer's Reliance on Bias and Prejudice 8 Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics (1994)
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Eric D. Blumenson & Eva Nilsen, Pretrial Procedure under the Massachusetts Rules of Criminal Procedure 67 Massachusetts Law Review (1982)
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Activities & Engagements
No upcoming activities or engagements.