Todd D. Fernow

Professor of Law Emeritus and Former Director, Criminal Law Clinic

Education/Professional Certification

JD, UConn Law School
BA, Cornell University

Expertise

Criminal Procedure, Constitutional Law, Criminal Justice, Criminal Law

Biography

Todd Fernow served as the director of UConn Law’s Criminal Clinic and as a highly respected member of the clinical staff after earning his JD at the Law School in 1983. For the past 30 years, he and his Criminal Clinic colleagues have supervised clinic students in hundreds of criminal trial level and post conviction cases in various Connecticut courts. In addition to teaching in the Criminal Clinic’s Trial and Appellate Divisions, Professor Fernow, a graduate of Cornell University, also regularly teaches Criminal Procedure and Advanced Criminal Procedure.

A widely recognized expert in criminal law, Professor Fernow is frequently interviewed by the print and electronic media regarding his opinions on various criminal matters and trials, particularly Connecticut-based trials. He also regularly participates in panel and forum discussions on a range of criminal law topics including most recently at an American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut forum on racial profiling. Professor Fernow has written and argued in dozens of cases before the Connecticut Appellate and Supreme Courts on behalf of clinic clients. Several of these cases are widely regarded as groundbreaking in Connecticut, most notably, State v. Hammond, the first DNA case presented to the Supreme Court, State v. Williams, the seminal case on prosecutorial misconduct, State v. Sanchez, a perjury case, Demers v. State, a leading criminal discovery case, and State v. McGann, a capital case which redefined the statutory definition of “murder-for-hire”. He has also made valuable written contributions to novel issues raised in Connecticut capital cases by other practitioners, including the controversial “born-alive” rule adopted in State v. Courchesne, where he formulated the ultimately successful claim that the evidence was legally insufficient to sustain the defendant’s conviction for capital felony murder.