Defense lawyers with pending capital cases came to college at Santa Clara University School of Law on July 31 for a six-day intensive training program with some of the nation’s leading death penalty attorneys.
The 14th annual Death Penalty College offers an intensive training program in which defense lawyers discuss their cases in small-group workshops. The Death Penalty College is presented by Santa Clara University, the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, and the California Public Defenders Association and co-sponsored by the American Bar Association’s Death Penalty Representation Project
The workshop sessions, which began July 31 and continued through Aug. 5, are not open to the public because of lawyer-client privilege.
“The college fosters a feeling of cooperation and community among participants and faculty who are united in the common goal of saving lives,” said Ellen Kreitzberg, professor of criminal law at Santa Clara University School of Law. “When it started, it was unique, in that lawyers bring actual cases to the workshop,” said Kreitzberg, who directs the program.”Every criminal defense attorney faces his or her greatest challenge in the representation of a person charged in a capital case,” she said.
The SCU law school program has consistently attracted leading death penalty attorneys from across the country.
The Death Penalty College has been approved for 36 hours of minimum continuing legal education credit by the State Bar of California.
Participants pay tuition to attend the program, and death penalty attorneys volunteer as faculty. Both students and faculty spend the week in seminars and discussions of ongoing cases in small-group workshops.
The college focuses on helping attorneys learn how to present the penalty phase of a death penalty case, which is held after a guilty verdict has been reached in a criminal trial. During the penalty phase, a jury considers factors that shape a defendant’s life.
Participants in the death penalty college are taught new skills, such as how to collect information and investigate a person’s background. “You’re not looking at facts, but at social history,” Kreitzberg says. “It’s very much like social work.”
In addition, courtroom techniques, such as a workshop on jury selection, closing statements and responding to damaging evidence, are emphasized in the training. “A lot of training programs can give training on the current status of law or appeals,” Kreitzberg says, “but we look at the abstract issue of how to present a case.”
