About
Eve Hanan is a Professor of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She brings extensive experience in criminal defense, having served as a public defender at the trial and appellate levels in Boston and Washington D.C. She also served as a restorative justice facilitator for court-involved youth in Baltimore City. Hanan entered academia to teach about our criminal legal systems and to research and write about the pressing issues faced by people who are targeted for policing, prosecution, and punishment. She previously served as the Associate Dean of Faculty Development and Research.
Hanan’s interdisciplinary scholarship analyzes the perspectives of the accused in criminal cases and the epistemic injustice caused by excluding their voices from legal decisions and policy making. She believes that the lived experiences of people targeted by criminal systems is critical to transforming unjust policies and legal practices. She has also published on racial bias in judicial assessments of remorse at sentencing, the perils of criminal justice reforms that rely on acts of discretion, and the lack of scientific validity behind the claim of characterological criminality.
She teaches criminal law and procedure, evidence, and a specialized course on the Sixth Amendment right to counsel and the role of the public defender. She also designs and teaches clinical courses where students represent clients charged with crimes. Starting Fall 2026, she will co-teach a new clinical residency program for her students in partnership with the local public defender’s office. One of her favorite aspects of law school teaching is mentoring students interested in public defense and other forms of equal justice advocacy. Her mentees value rigor, fairness, empathy, and are determined to be zealous advocates for their clients.
Hanan puts her experience and scholarship to work in collaborations with lawmakers and advocacy organizations such as ACLU Nevada, If/When/How, and Return Strong. She is a member of the national Advisory Board of the Fines and Fees Justice Center. She is a Board Member of the UNLV Program on Race, Gender, and Policing. She’s an appointed member of the Nevada Sentencing Commission’s Misdemeanor Subcommittee. While she doesn’t represent people outside of her clinical courses, she welcomes incarcerated people in the greater Nevada area to reach out.
She has a JD from the University of Michigan Law School. During her time there, she served in the Department of Human Rights & Refugees of the US Department of State and investigated human rights claims at the Palestine Peace Project in Ramallah.
Bar Admissions
Massachusetts Bar, 1999 to present
New York Bar, 2022 to present
DC Bar, 2005 to present
Maryland Bar, 2014 to present
Nevada Certificate of Limited Practice, 2018-present
Education
University of Michigan Law School, JD
Clinics: Poverty Law Clinic, Advanced Clinic
Summers: U.S. Dept. Of State, Office of the Legal Advisor, Dept. of Human Rights & Refugees; D.C. Public Defender Service; Palestine Peace Project in Ramallah, Palestinian Territories
Drexel University, MA in Creative Arts Therapy
John Hopkins University, Maryland Courses in Addiction Counseling and Family & Couple Therapy
University of Chicago, Illinois Summer Arabic Language Intensive
Arabic Teaching Institute in Damascus, Syria, Certificate for a year-long course study of classical Arabic
Metropolitan State College of Denver, Colorado, summa cum laude, BA in Multicultural Women’s Studies with a minor in Middle Eastern Studies
Misdemeanor Subcommittee of the Nevada Department of Sentencing Policy
As a member of the Misdemeanor Subcommittee, Eve is part of an ongoing, comprehensive review of Nevada’s misdemeanor laws, gathering data and making substantive recommendations to promote justice and fairness.
Most people prosecuted for crimes are charged with low-level misdemeanors. Even when they don’t face jail time, the combination of fines, fees, and conditions of probation can be profoundly detrimental to their ability to care for their families and pay their bills. At the same time, many low-level misdemeanors may be unconstitutionally vague while failing to serve a meaningful role in public safety.
Court Monitorship
Outside of her role as a UNLV professor, Eve serves as the monitor to Nevada’s First Judicial District Court for the Stipulated Consent Judgment in Davis v. State, which requires the State of Nevada to implement systemic reforms to ensure indigent defendants in rural counties receive effective legal assistance at every critical stage of their case. The Stipulated Consent Judgment represents a historic step toward ensuring equal justice and upholding the Sixth Amendment rights of Nevadans who cannot afford legal counsel.
Eve Hanan 