NATIONAL CRIMINAL DEFENSE COLLEGE FACULTY
S
Martin Sabelli
Attorney
Biography
Martín has represented individuals and tried many cases in state and federal courts since 1993 in
a wide range of civil and criminal matters including complex federal white-collar criminal
prosecutions, multi-defendant federal conspiracy cases, federal and state gang-related
prosecutions, federal and state death-penalty homicides, civil trials and arbitrations, and capital
habeas corpus matters. He focuses his practice on federal gang/RICO capital defense.
Martín served as a federal public defender in the Northern District of California (San Francisco),
as the Director of Training for the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, and as a law clerk to
the late Honorable Robert F. Peckham, United States District Judge. He taught Latin American
History at Yale College as a Lecturer (1990-1991).
Martín is President-Elect of NACDL and was awarded NACDL’s Highly Prestigious
Champion of Justice Award for 2019. He serves as Chair of its Ninth Circuit Lawyer’s
Assistance Strike Force and Trial Penalty Task Force and as a member of its Ethics Advisory
Committee.
Martín is a Member of the Board of Regents of the National Criminal Defense College and has
taught at the College without interruption since 2001. Martín has also taught for the Trial
Advocacy Workshop for Harvard Law School, the National Institute for Trial Advocacy, and
NACDL as well as numerous other criminal defense and public defense programs around the
country and abroad.
Martín has participated in legal reform efforts in Argentina since 2008 in numerous provinces
and the federal system. He lectures often on comparative criminal justice issues and has trained
public defenders, judges, prosecutors, and lawyers in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile,
Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Uruguay, and numerous other countries. Martín established a school
for public defenders in Buenos Aires which, to date, has trained approximately 500 defenders
from twelve Central and South American countries. He has also trained judges, prosecutors, and
lawyers in numerous other countries including Nicaragua, Tunisia, and Egypt.
Martín served as Director of the Mexico Program for the National Institute of Trial Advocacy from 2005 to 2007.
He is a graduate of Harvard College, the London School of Economics and Political Science, and
Yale Law School.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Jon Sands
Federal Defender, District of Arizona
Biography
Jon M. Sands has devoted his career to the defense of indigent federal criminal defendants at the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the District of Arizona. As an Assistant Federal Defender since 1987, and as the Federal Public Defender since 2004, Jon has handled cases at trial, on appeal, and in post-conviction habeas corpus litigation. Jon is a graduate of Yale College (1979, magna cum laude), and received his law degree from the University of California, Davis (1984, high honors), where he was editor-in-chief of the Law Review.
After graduation, Jon clerked for the Honorable Mary M. Schroeder, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (which brought him to Arizona). Before joining the Federal Public Defender’s Office, Jon was an Associate at Meyer, Hendricks, Victor, Osborn, Maledon (presently Osborn Maledon). Jon served as Chair of the State Bar’s Committee on Professional Responsibility. He has also served as Chair of the State Bar’s Criminal Justice Section and as Chair of the State Bar’s Criminal Jury Instructions Committee.
Jon is presently the Chair of the Defender Services Advisory Group, which represents all Federal Defender and Community Defender offices in advising the Judicial Conference’s Defender Services Committee and the Administrative Office of the United States Courts on federal indigent defense matters. He has also been Chair of the Federal Defender Committee on the United States Sentencing Guidelines, which is congressionally charged with advising and testifying before the United States Sentencing Commission. Jon has been President of the Arizona Attorneys for Criminal Justice and President of the National Association of Federal Defenders. In addition to his public defender duties, Jon is an adjunct faculty at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, and is a faculty member of the National Criminal Defense College. He has published numerous legal articles, law reviews, essays, and book reviews, and has contributed chapters to several legal treatises. Jon has lectured and taught on a wide array of legal topics.”
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Barry Scheck
Co-Director
Notes
TPI Graduate
Juval Scott
Federal Public Defender for the Western District of Virginia
Biography
JUVAL O. SCOTT has been the Federal Public Defender for the Western District of Virginia since January 2019. Her district consists of three offices (Roanoke, Charlottesville, and Abingdon) that handle federal criminal cases charged in the seven court locations that span the western 63% of the state. Prior to her appointment as Federal Public Defender, she was an enthusiastic Attorney Advisor with the Training Division of the Defender Services Office in Washington, DC. Before joining the Training Division, she was an Assistant Federal Defender in the Milwaukee office of the Federal Defender Services of Wisconsin, Inc. and with the Indiana Federal Community Defenders in Indianapolis, Indiana. In her former life, Juval worked as an associate in a small firm primarily handling criminal, personal injury, and family law matters; a deputy prosecutor for the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor’s Office in Lafayette, Indiana; and as Associate General Counsel for a private investigation firm focusing on trademark litigation. She has also served as Judge Pro Tempore in the Marion County Criminal Courts.
Juval received her law degree from the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law, and she obtained her Bachelor of Science in Biology with a minor in Chemistry from Xavier University of Louisiana. She regularly teaches at local CJA panel trainings and programs sponsored by the Defender Services Office Training Division, as well as The National Criminal Defense College, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and their state affiliates, Wisconsin State Public Defender, The Bronx Defenders, and the National Bar Association.
She is married to Randle B. Pollard, Of Counsel with Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart, P.C. They have three children—Charles Beauchamp, Jr., a senior studying neuroscience at Duke University; Mason Pollard, a precocious and nature-loving fifth-grader at St. Anne’s-Belfield School; and Zion Pollard, a professorial and humorous fifth-grader at St. Anne’s-Belfield School.
She is a voracious reader, savors moments with friends and family, and is an avid traveler, having visited 37 countries spanning six continents and 40 states.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Jennifer Sellitti
New Jersey Public Defender
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Dumaka Shabazz
Federal Public Defender, Middle District of Tennessee
Biography
Dumaka Shabazz is a federal public defender based in Nashville, Tennessee, where he represents clients charged with fraud, homicide, and other violent, white-collar or large-scale narcotics crimes. Before joining the Federal Public Defender’s Office in 2010, Professor Shabazz was a criminal defense attorney in private practice for five years. He began his legal career in the Davidson County District Attorney’s Office, where he prosecuted criminal cases through negotiation, motions practice and trials, and participated in numerous jury trials involving crimes from DUI to homicide.
He is a staff teacher at the New Defender College for newly hired federal public defenders, based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and has been a guest lecturer at Vanderbilt University and Sewanee—The University of the South. At Vanderbilt, he teaches Trial Advocacy.
Laurie Shanks
Biography
Laurie Shanks has been a criminal defense attorney for almost 40 years. In addition, she is an Emerita Clinical Professor of Law at Albany Law School, where she taught Client Interviewing and Counseling, Fact Investigation, Negotiations and Trial Practice and Advocacy courses. She served on the New York Task Force on the Future of Indigent Defense and the Task Force on Wrongful Convictions. She attended NCDC as a participant in 1981 and has been a faculty member since 1988. She is a frequent lecturer at conferences and seminars throughout the country on the topics of cross-examination in cases of child sexual abuse, opening statements and closing arguments, voir dire, client interviewing and counseling, trial preparation and client-centered representation.
Laurie has substantial and wide-ranging experience in criminal justice systems in the United States and abroad. She was invited to Tula Russia to assist judges and attorneys in the implementation of a jury system in criminal trials. She taught a comparative Trial Practice class in Paris, France and was invited to be one of the plenary speakers at the Pacific Judicial Council in Pohnpei, Micronesia. Additionally, she has provided extensive training to the attorneys and investigators at the Guam Public Defenders Office and taught at the University of Chile in Santiago as a Fulbright Specialist in October 2018.”
Bart Sheela
Deputy Public Defender
Biography
Bart Sheela is an Alternate Public Defender in San Diego. In his over thirty-five years of practice, he has tried just about every variety of criminal case, including several capital cases.
He has served on the California Public Defender Association’s Board of Directors for nearly 20 years and has served as its President. He has assisted in the planning of the Capital Case Defense Seminar, the largest capital case defense program in the nation, for the last 10 years. In addition, he has been a co-chair of the Training Committee for 10+ years and planned nearly 100 trainings for California lawyers. In 2019, he was chosen as the Public Defender of the Year.
He was formerly the Chair of the California State Bar’s Committee on Professional Responsibility and Conduct and has written and lectured on legal ethics and trial practice.
He proudly serves on the faculty at the National Criminal Defense College and the Clarence Darrow Death Penalty Defense College.
He has successfully resolved his last seven death penalty cases.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
James Shellow
Notes
TPI Graduate
Jeff Sherr
Training Director, National Association for Public Defense
Biography
Jeff Sherr is the Training Director for the National Association for Public Defense producing hundreds of webinars for public defense professionals across the nation. Prior to that he was the Manager of the Education and Strategic Planning Branch of the Kentucky Department of Public Advocacy. Jeff started with the DPA since 1994, starting first as a law clerk, then working with the Juvenile Post Dispositional Unit, then in the trial division with the Stanford Field Office, and now in Frankfort with the education staff. Jeff graduated from the University of Kentucky College of Law in 1995. Jeff has been a faculty member for Gideon’s Promise, the National Criminal Defense College, Clarence Darrow Death Penalty College, Harvard Trial Advocacy Workshop, Bronx Defender Academy, and other state litigation institutes.
In addition to regularly training public defender litigators and trainers, Jeff trains public defender leaders nationally and for many individual defender states and offices. Jeff also has an extensive background in theatre having studied with the National Shakespeare Conservatory and the University of Kansas. Jeff performs regularly with Central Kentucky Improv in Lexington, Kentucky and at Improv Festivals across the country.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
David Shircliff
Criminal Defense at Shircliff Law
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Natasha Perdew Silas
Senior Litigation Attorney; Federal Defender Program, Inc.
Biography
Natasha Perdew Silas became the Dean of the National Criminal Defense College in August of 2017 along with new bestie Karen Smolar. Together they are the third Deans of NCDC. For the past two plus years, Karen and Tasha have worked tirelessly to honor the legacy of the College, to move it forward, and to help it in all ways fulfill its mission of pursuing justice by empowering defenders.
Tasha has twenty-five years of experience as a trial lawyer with the Federal Defender Program in the Northern District of Georgia, where she now serves as a Senior Litigation Attorney still representing clients before the district and circuit courts.
Tasha credits NCDC with helping her to find her voice and power in the courtroom and she has a passion for helping others in their quests to continually improve courtroom advocacy. Tasha has taught extensively in the State of Georgia, in various other states, and also internationally in the Republic of Georgia. She is a proud member of the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. She is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers. She has received a number of awards for her work and advocacy including from the Southern Center for Human Rights and the Gate City Bar Association.
Tasha lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and two children.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Fredilyn Sison
Assistant Federal Public Defender, Western District of North Carolina
Biography
Where hasn’t Fredi worked? She’s been an Assistant Federal Defender in Omaha, Nebraska; Boise, Idaho; Reno, Nevada and Asheville, North Carolina, with side stops in Washington, DC as visiting counsel at the Defender Training Branch and at the U.S. Sentencing Commission. She’s in such “high demand” that she recently received a recruiting email asking her if she would like to be a legal assistant in an up and coming workers’ comp firm. She wrote back thanking them but she was having too much fun being an advocate for poor people and had to decline their lovely offer. Then she killed her LinkedIn account.
An honors grad of Cornell University and New York University School of Law, Fredi has served on the faculty for numerous programs around the country. Her favorite tag line during her teaching sessions is, “You understand this is interactive, right?” To date, no one has successfully slunk down low enough for her to not make eye contact and ask for a volunteer.
Fredi co-authored Trial in Action: The Persuasive Power of Psychodrama and expects to be an answer to a trivia question one day because of it. She’s written article/chapters on various topics: child pornography, voir dire, cross examination and the effects of incarceration on families. Her two passions are psychodrama (where she’s certified as a practitioner, not to be confused with being certified period) and Improv. She will play improv games all day if allowed, and you’ll often hear her muttering, “Whoosh, Bang, Pow!”
Notes
Recent Teaching History
James Smith III
James Smith Attorney at Law
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Karen Smolar
Training Director, Committee for Public Counsel Services
Biography
Karen has served as a devoted faculty member of NCDC since the year after attending as a Participant in 2007. After working as a public defender and then in private practice as a criminal trial attorney, she was a public defender in NYC at The Bronx Defenders from 2000 to 2018 as a staff attorney, supervisor, team leader and finally as the Trial Chief and the Director of Homicides. She is now the Legal Training Director at the Committee for Public Counsel Services in Massachusetts. While at the Bronx Defenders, Karen created The Defenders’ Academy, an innovative trial skills program for public and private attorneys across the nation, which focuses on the intersection between trial skills and performance work.
Karen has been an adjunct professor at St. John’s School of Law teaching Trial Advocacy and at Seton Hall Law School teaching Persuasion and Advocacy. She has lectured on various topics for the NACDL and the New York State Defenders Association. She has also been a guest trainer at various state-wide public defender programs across the nation. Karen graduated from Brooklyn Law School, where she was an Edward V. Sparer Public Interest Fellow and holds a B.A. from Wesleyan University. Her interest in performance work stems from her lifelong love for music, dance and sports. She lives in Rhode Island with her husband Jeff and her two children.
Callie Steele
Federal Public Defender
Biography
Callie Glanton Steele has devoted her career to the defense of indigent federal criminal clients at the Office of the Federal Public Defender in Los Angeles for the past 28 years. She has been the Senior Litigator from September of 2015 to the present, primarily handling complex cases. Also, she was a Supervising Deputy Federal Public Defender (2002 to September of 2015) and a Deputy Federal Public Defender in the trial unit (1992 to 2002). In 2000 and 2001, she was on a temporary duty assignment in Washington, D.C., where she was Special Counsel to the United States Sentencing Commission (November of 2000 to May of 2001), and a Visiting Defender at Defender Services Division with the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (May to November of 2001), working in the Legal and Policy Division.
She graduated from UCLA School of Law in 1991, and served as a judicial extern for the Honorable Terry J. Hatter, Jr., United States District Judge in the fall of 1990.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Michael Stout
Attorney, Law Offices of Michael L. Stout
Biography
Michael L. Stout is a trial attorney specializing in Criminal Law. He received a J.D. from the University of New Mexico School of Law and is a Recognized Specialist in Criminal Law. He often teaches other lawyers throughout the nation through workshops and seminars, especially in the area of jury selection.
Michael has been on the faculty of the National Criminal Defense College for 36 years. He was the first chair of the New Mexico Public Defense Commission and remains a member of the Commission. Michael also serves as the acting President of New Mexico Justice, a Criminal Justice PAC. He is an AV rated attorney and has been named in every issue of the Best Lawyers of America, SuperLawyers, and most recently on America’s Top 100 Criminal Defense Attorneys.
Notes
Recent Teaching History
Dean Strang
Distinguished Professor in Residence
Biography
Dean A. Strang is a Distinguished Professor in Residence at Loyola University Chicago School of Law, and a criminal defense lawyer. He is known for his work in a trial documented in Netflix’s Making A Murderer and for his books of legal history, Keep the Wretches in Order: America’s Biggest Mass Trial, the Rise of the Justice Department, and the Fall of the IWW; and Worse Than the Devil: Anarchists, Clarence Darrow, and Justice in a Time of Terror. He also has written several law review articles. Mr. Strang’s past work includes five years as Wisconsin’s first Federal Defender. He has argued in the United States Supreme Court and five federal Courts of Appeal. Mr. Strang is a co-founder of the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences and a member of the American Law Institute since 2004. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin.
Notes
University of Virginia, 1995
Ryan Swingle
Ryan J. Swingle, Attorney at Law, LLC
Biography
Ryan is a criminal defense attorney based in Athens, Georgia who practices in both federal and state courts. Ryan is a former state public defender and state capital defender. Ryan began his legal career in 2001 as an Athens public defender. For 12 years, Ryan dedicated himself to defending indigent defendants in Athens on cases ranging from disorderly conduct to murder. During his five years as lead attorney for the Northeast Georgia Capital Defender Office, none of the office’s clients were sentenced to death. Ryan’s current private practice focuses 100% on criminal defense. Ryan is an experienced trial lawyer having tried all manner of misdemeanor and felony cases. Ryan is also a faculty member of the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers Bill Daniel Trial Advocacy Program.
Notes
Recent Teaching History