Ronald S. Sullivan Jr. Biography

Professor Sullivan is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of criminal law, criminal process, trial practice and methods, legal ethics, and race theory. He directs the Harvard Criminal Justice Institute and the Harvard Trial Advocacy Workshop as a faculty member. Professor Sullivan is also the Faculty Dean (previously "Master") of Harvard College's Winthrop House. He was the first African American to be named Master of Harvard in the university's history in 2009. Professor Sullivan has combined legal theory and practice in novel and cutting-edge ways throughout his career. Indeed, he is frequently hired to defend clients in “impossible” situations, according to many in the legal world. Professor Sullivan, for example, was acquitted in the double murder case involving former New England Patriot Aaron Hernandez. Even after the US Department of Justice failed to prosecute the case, he successfully represented the family of Michael Brown in negotiating a wrongful death settlement with the city of Ferguson. In one of the country's largest Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities Fraud cases — a six-count federal indictment – he was acquitted. Finally, Professor Sullivan was recently appointed as a special prosecutor to oversee the trial of Missouri's previous governor, who eventually resigned. Professor Sullivan chaired Senator Barack Obama's presidential campaign's Criminal Justice Advisory Committee in 2008. Professor Sullivan's group provided policy recommendations on a variety of topics in this role, with the goal of putting some of the greatest research in the area into reality. He was also a member of the Barack Obama Presidential Campaign's National Legal Advisory Group. Professor Sullivan was also named to the Department of Justice Presidential Transition Team as an advisor. Professor Sullivan was requested to design a mechanism to handle a criminal justice issue in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2007. Thousands of people were imprisoned in and around New Orleans without representation, and Hurricane Katrina destroyed all official documents. Professor Sullivan created an indigent defense delivery system that led to the release of thousands of convicts who had been wrongly imprisoned. Professor Sullivan served on a committee entrusted with developing a new constitution for Kenya as a visiting researcher for the Law Society of Kenya in 1994. He also collaborated with Kenya's Human Rights Commission to monitor and challenge human rights violations in the country. Professor Sullivan was formerly on the Yale Law School faculty, where he received the prize for excellent teaching after his first year. He was the Director of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia before entering the legal college. He also worked at two large Washington, D.C. legal firms for several years, specializing in white-collar criminal defense and complex commercial litigation. Professor Sullivan has been on CNN, Fox News, PBS, and other major networks to offer legal analysis. He has been quoted in many of the country's top newspapers and magazines, and he has testified before the US Senate and House of Representatives on several occasions.

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