Sharon Brett

Associate Professor of Law

she/her/hers

Contact Info

sharonbrett@ku.edu

502 Green Hall

Biography —

Sharon Brett joined the KU Law faculty as an associate professor of law in 2024. Her scholarship focuses on structural, procedural and doctrinal impediments to systemic reform of government institutions, with a specific focus on the criminal legal system and policing. Brett’s work has appeared in the Harvard Civil Rights & Civil Liberties Law Review, the Duke Law Journal Online and the U.C.L.A. Criminal Justice Law Review.

Immediately prior to joining the faculty at KU, Brett was the legal director at the ACLU of Kansas where she led complex civil rights litigation in Kansas state and federal courts. She has first chaired numerous trials and argued several appeals on cases regarding voting rights and redistricting, the Fourth Amendment, LGBTQ+ rights and more.

After graduating from the University of Michigan Law School, magna cum laude, Brett clerked for Judge John M. Facciola (ret.) on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. She then joined the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Special Litigation Section through the Attorney General’s Honors Program. While there, Brett investigated and litigated large-scale police misconduct and prison conditions cases. She also wrote amicus briefs on behalf of the United States on a variety of civil rights issues. She then spent two years as a senior staff attorney with Harvard Law School's Criminal Justice Policy Program, conducting research and policy reform advocacy regarding fines and fees charged to criminal defendants.

Education —

J.D., University of Michigan Law School, 2012
Magna cum laude

B.A., University of Michigan, 2005
With distinction

Teaching —

Civil Procedure, Evidence, Federal Courts, Social Justice Lawyering

Admitted

New York (2013), Kansas (2020), 10th Circuit Court of Appeals (2020), U.S. District Courts for Kansas (2020), Arizona (2015), Eastern District Missouri (2015), Eastern District Louisiana (2014), U.S. Virgin Islands (2013)

Clerkships

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Judge John M. Facciola (ret.), 2012-2013

Selected Publications —

Policing the State Police: System Reform within the “Fiction” of Ex parte Young, 59 Harv. C.R. & C.L. L. Rev. 175 (2024).

Reforming Monetary Sanctions, Reducing Police Violence, 4 U.C.L.A. Crim. Just. L. Rev. 17 (2020).

Court Culture and Criminal Law Reform (with Colin Doyle and Mitali Nagrecha), 69 Duke L. J. Online (Apr. 2020).

Selected Presentations —

Moderator, Building and Maintaining Meaningful Pro Bono Partnerships, Kansas Women’s Attorney Association Annual Conference (July 2024, Lindsborg, KS)

Discussant, Public Law in the States Annual Conference, University of Wisconsin Law School State Democracy Research Initiative (May 2024, Madison, WI).

Panelist, The Promise and Limits of State Constitutionalism, NYU Law Review Symposium/Brennan Center for Justice State Courts Project (Feb. 2024, New York, NY).

Presenter, From Individual Cases to Systemic Reform: Collaborating with Civil Rights Lawyers to Change the System, Kansas State Board of Indigent Defense Services Annual Conference (June 2023, Topeka, KS).

Presenter, Litigating for Systemic Reform in Policing: Case Updates, Kansas Federal Public Defender Spring CLE (April 2023, Lawrence, KS).

Keynote, Justice-Related Data and its Implications for Civil Rights and Liberties Work, University of Kansas Self Graduate Fellows Luncheon (November 2022, Lawrence, KS)

Presenter, State of Reform, Convening on Fines and Fees Policy in California, UCLA Law School and the UCLA Labor Center (upcoming Jan. 2020, Los Angeles, CA).

Presenter, Ability to Pay Models, Economic Justice in the Courts, Litigation, and Advocacy 2020 Summit, Southern Poverty Law Center (Jan. 2020, Montgomery, AL).