Alan Morton Dershowitz in the United States

Dershowitz, Alan Morton (1938- ), American law professor and defense attorney, born in New York City, and educated at Brooklyn College and Yale Law School (1962), graduating first in his class. Dershowitz served a one-year clerkship in 1963 with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Arthur J. Goldberg and in 1964 accepted a faculty appointment at Harvard Law School.

An advocate of constitutional rights and freedoms, Dershowitz believed that the slightest encroachment of any such rights created the possibility of further undermining of constitutional protections. For his work on human rights, Dershowitz received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1979. Dershowitz became noted for representing unpopular and controversial defendants, such as the socialite Claus von Bulow (1984), whose conviction for murder Dershowitz successfully overturned in a second trial; hotel owner Leona M. Helmsley (1989), who was imprisoned for income tax evasion; boxer Mike Tyson (1992), sentenced to prison for rape; and actress Mia Farrow (1992-93), who charged her former mate Woody Allen with child abuse. He wrote several books expressing his outspoken views and legal experiences, including The Best Defense (1982); Reversal of Fortune (1986), about the von Bulow case, which was made into a film; Chutzpah (1991), about his activities on behalf of Jewish causes; and Contrary to Public Opinion (1992).

Source: Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2000