{"id":13529,"date":"2015-11-16T20:14:26","date_gmt":"2015-11-17T01:14:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/?page_id=13529"},"modified":"2026-04-07T10:29:51","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T14:29:51","slug":"criminal-law","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/academics\/explore-your-options\/criminal-law\/","title":{"rendered":"Criminal Law"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">The <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/academics\/areas-of-study\/criminal-law\/\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">criminal law program<\/span><\/a><span data-contrast=\"auto\"> at BU Law encompasses not only foundational criminal procedure and evidence courses but also a wide range of clinical offerings in which students handle actual cases in court. BU Law\u2019s unique\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/current-students\/jd-student-resources\/experiential-learning\/clinics\/criminal-law-clinical-program\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" data-auth=\"NotApplicable\" title=\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/current-students\/jd-student-resources\/experiential-learning\/clinics\/criminal-law-clinical-program\/\" data-linkindex=\"0\">Criminal Law Clinical Program,<\/a> ranked #28 in the nation for 2026-27 by <em>U.S. News &amp; World Report<\/em>, allows students to view the system from both sides, providing opportunities to defend clients facing criminal prosecution as well as prosecute cases on behalf of the district attorney. In their first semester, students act in a supporting role on cases handled by \u2018senior\u2019 members of the Defender Clinic and of one of the country\u2019s few Prosecutor Clinics (students with a strong preference may, however, select to work exclusively on only defense or prosecution matters). In their second semester, \u2018senior\u2019 students work exclusively as a student Prosecutor or student Defender and carry full responsibility for their cases.<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\"> <\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span aria-label=\"Rich text content control paragraph\"><span data-contrast=\"auto\">In the classroom, criminal law courses and seminars cover everything from white-collar crime\u2014including whistleblower law and financial institution self-regulation\u2014to military law; international criminal law; and gender, violence, and the law.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span aria-label=\"Rich text content control\"><span data-contrast=\"auto\">LLM students can choose from among the JD offerings and also, through the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/academics\/llm-masters-degrees\/american-law\/\">LLM in American Law<\/a> program<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">, are introduced to these topics through <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/academics\/llm-masters-degrees\/american-law\/llm-only-courses\/\"><span data-contrast=\"auto\">LLM-only courses<\/span><\/a><span data-contrast=\"auto\"> such as Criminal Law for LLMs and Fundamentals of US Constitutional Law for LLM Students, among others. <\/span><\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The criminal law program at BU Law encompasses not only foundational criminal procedure and evidence [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10885,"featured_media":109115,"parent":89808,"menu_order":6,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"bu-landing","meta":[],"bu-publication":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13529"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10885"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13529"}],"version-history":[{"count":36,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124245,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/13529\/revisions\/124245"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/89808"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/law\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=13529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}