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Erik Luna

Adjunct Scholar

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Erik Luna is a law professor at Washington and Lee University. His interests include criminal law, criminal procedure, and constitutional law. Luna was a prosecutor in the San Diego District Attorney's Office and a fellow and lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School. He has served as the senior Fulbright Scholar to New Zealand, where he taught at Victoria University Law School and conducted research on restorative justice. Luna has also been a visiting professor with the Cuban Society of Penal Sciences and has taught U.S. constitutional law and criminal justice to judges and attorneys in Cuba. Most recently, he was a visiting scholar at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law in Freiburg, Germany, the world's foremost center for the comparative study of criminal law and procedure. Prior to coming to Washington and Lee University, Luna was the Hugh B. Brown Professor of Law at the University of Utah and co-director of the Utah Criminal Justice Center. Among other professional activities, he is a member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Working Group on Criminal Law Issues. Luna graduated summa cum laude from the University of Southern California, and he received his J.D. with honors from Stanford Law School, where he was an editor of the Stanford Law Review.


Media Contact: 202-789-5200
To Book a Speaking Engagement: 202-789-5226



Cato Studies

"Misguided Guidelines: A Critique of Federal Sentencing," Policy Analysis no. 458, November 1, 2002.

Opinion and Commentary

"A Criminal Red Herring in Corporate Reform," Cato.org, January 21, 2005

"Reprieve on Sentencing Guidelines?," Cato.org, August 12, 2004

"Let Judges Do Their Job," Philadelphia Inquirer, August 9, 2004

"Time to Undo the Unjust Sentencing Guidelines," Cato.org, November 13, 2002

Speeches and Testimony

Indigent Representation: A Growing National Crisis, Testimony, June 4, 2009.

Representation of Indigent Defendants in Criminal Cases: A Constitutional Crisis in Michigan and Other States?, Testimony, March 26, 2009.