NATIONAL CRIMINAL DEFENSE COLLEGE FACULTY
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Chris Adams
Attorney, Adams & Bischoff
Biography
Chris concentrates in criminal defense in federal and state courts. Chris concentrates on defending clients accused of white collar crimes, street crimes, sex offenses and capital murder in the South and around the country.
Since launching his private practice in 2007, Chris has represented clients in serious matters from Las Vegas to New York City to San Juan, Puerto Rico. However, the bulk of his practice is fighting for men and women accused of crimes in and around South Carolina.
Norma Aguilar
Federal Defenders of San Diego
Tara Allen
Roger Williams School of Law
Biography
Tara I. Allen is an Associate Professor of Law at Roger Williams University School of Law where she teaches Evidence, Criminal Procedure, Criminal Law, and Trial Advocacy. She was an Assistant Federal Public Defender, first with the Eastern District of California, then the Western District of Pennsylvania and, most recently, the District of Rhode Island. Prior to joining the Federal Defenders organization, Tara was a supervising staff attorney for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco and a law clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York City. She also served as a judicial intern in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts under Chief Magistrate Judge Joyce London Alexander.
Tara taught Legal Writing & Research and Moot Court at University of California Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco, CA, and Appellate Advocacy at University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento, CA.
Tara is a visiting faculty member at NCDC Trial Practice Institute (NCDC) and a 2005 alumna of the program. She is on the faculty of the Federal Criminal Justice Act Trial Skills Academy (TSA), administered by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, and has served as a panelist and presenter for numerous legal skills trainings and workshops.
Tara received her JD from Northeastern University School Law in Boston, MA and her BA from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT.
Jenny Andrews
Sr. Deputy Public Defender; Santa Barbara Office
Biography
A child of counterculture, raised off the grid by back-to-the-land hippies in Northern California, Jenny Andrews is a graduate of Cornell University and Harvard Law School. She has been a public defender in California since 1996 and is currently the Director of Training and Career Development at the Santa Barbara County Public Defender, where she is creating a new training curriculum and litigating capital cases. She teaches on the faculty of Gideon’s Promise, the Trial Advocacy Workshop at Harvard Law School, and the Trial Skills Institute of the California Public Defenders Association.
She believes in finding supportive practices to sustain a career in public defense—hers include yoga and meditation, writing, hiking along the beach with her husband and daughter, and tending a rural apple farm in Northern California.
Notes
Recent Teaching History