April 19th 2006 • Printer version

Criminal law expert Margaret Paris appointed dean of the University of Oregon School of Law

Margaret L. "Margie" Paris, for several years the law school's associate dean for academic affairs and interim dean since January, has been appointed dean of the University of Oregon School of Law. She will serve through June 30, 2008.

Rennard Strickand, Knight Professor of Law and a former dean of the law school, said Margie Paris is one of those rare souls who is both a thinker and a doer. The law school and the state of Oregon is fortunate that she will take on the tasks of guiding the curriculum, recruiting students and faculty, and raising money. She has already done all of those things and done them well, while continuing to smile.

Lorraine Davis, UO vice president for academic affairs, said the law school faculty showed widespread and enthusiastic support for Paris appointment after a national search for a new dean proved unsuccessful. She has made an exceptionally smooth transition from associate dean to interim dean, and has already provided strong leadership in advancing several new initiatives. I am confident that the law school will be well served by Dean Paris, and I am pleased that she has agreed to accept this appointment.

With this appointment, Margie Paris becomes the first woman dean of the school whose faculty she joined in 1992.  She teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, and appellate advocacy.  In private life, she is an active birder who makes sure the law school is notified each spring and fall when migratory Vaux's Swifts roost by the thousands in the nearby Agate Hall chimney.

Paris' scholarly work focuses on the reform of the criminal justice system, and she co-authored a textbook on criminal procedure, Constitutional Criminal Procedure (Foundation Press 2003).

She practiced criminal law for six years at the Chicago firm of Cotsirilos, Stephenson, Tighe & Streicker, specializing in the defense of white-collar prosecutions and civil lawsuits in federal courts. She is a member of the Oregon Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, the Illinois Bar and the bars of several federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.