Faculty

Michael Brennan is an authority on the three-strikes law and the death penalty, as well as criminal defense and appeals.

A specialist in clinical legal education, Brennan co-directs the Post-Conviction Justice Project and teaches Trial Advocacy. He was the directing attorney for California Rural Legal Assistance before teaching at USC Gould School of Law and then Emory University. He also served as deputy federal public defender and as a partner in Balaban, Stern and Brennan before returning to USC Law in 1984.

Brennan received his BA and LLB from the UC Berkeley. He is a member of the Federal Bar Association and the Los Angeles County Bar Association. He previously chaired the Federal Indigent Defense Panel Selection Committee for the United States District Court for the Central District of California, served as a member of the LACBA Judicial Evaluation Committee, consulted for the National Legal Services Training Program and was a member of the National Institute for Trial Advocacy.

FACULTY IN THE NEWS

Inverse
April 20, 2018
Re: Jody David Armour

Jody Armour was quoted about the racist enforcement of marijuana-related crimes. “The 4/20 celebrations should be tempered by a sober recognition that many disproportionately black lives have been sacrificed on the altar of a failed drug war that was racist at its inception and in its execution,” Armour said. “More than just a day of celebration, 4/20 should be a day of reckoning in which liberal and progressive politicians are called out for their many years of support for a racist and wasteful war on drugs.”

RECENT SCHOLARSHIP

Robert K. Rasmussen
January, 2018

"Puerto Rico and the Netherworld of Sovereign Debt Restructuring," Workshop, Duke Law School, Durham, NC. 

Edward Kleinbard
January, 2018

"The Right Tax at the Right Time," Florida Tax Review 21 (2017): 208.

Edward Kleinbard
January, 2018

“The Perversion of the Tax Policy Process,” Keynote Address at the USC Tax Institute, Los Angeles, CA.