Sandra Simkins is a nationally recognized expert in juvenile defense. Her areas of
expertise include post-disposition representation, conditions of
confinement, and solitary. A
published author, she was selected by the McArthur Foundation to
participate in a juvenile justice reform initiative and is the due process monitor in the settlement agreement between the Department of
Justice and the Juvenile Court of Shelby County Tennessee.
Professor Simkins is the director and cofounder of the Children's
Justice Clinic at Rutgers Law School. In 2012 she
received the Robert E. Shepard Jr. award for excellence in Juvenile
Defense. Her book, When Kids Get Arrested, What Every Adult Should Know,
was released in 2009. In 2008, she was selected by the MacArthur
Foundation to participate in the Models for Change Juvenile Indigent
Defense Action Network.
Prior to joining the Rutgers faculty in 2006, she spent 15 years
working in criminal and juvenile defense. She served as assistant chief
of the Juvenile Unit at the Defender Association of Philadelphia,
supervising and training a staff of 40, including 23 lawyers, to
represent children in the juvenile justice system. Professor Simkins
also was involved in wide range of national and statewide policy reform
for children.
In 2009, she was selected as Lawyering Professor of the Year and
in 2007 she received the New Professor of the Year award, both at the
Rutgers School of Law-Camden.
She also codirects the Northeast Region Juvenile Defender Center, a
subsidiary of the National Juvenile Defender Center, where she provides
consultation and training to child advocates in Delaware, New Jersey,
New York, and Pennsylvania. She has championed the creation of effective
statewide coalitions and led fundraising initiatives for program
development. Her various fundraising efforts have created a specialized
mental health and special education attorney, and a statewide training
program for juvenile defenders in the state of Pennsylvania.
She was selected by Harvard Business School's Social Enterprise
Philadelphia Club in 2005 to participate in advanced nonprofit
management training. In 2004, she was chosen by the MacArthur Foundation
to partner with the Foundation's Juvenile Justice Aftercare Initiative
in Pennsylvania, and was recognized in The Philadelphia Lawyer for
providing strong advocacy for children at each stage of juvenile court
involvement. In 2002, she was the recipient of the American Bar
Association's Award for Outstanding Representation of Children.
Professor Simkins has taught the Criminal Defense Clinic at the
University of Pennsylvania Law School and Juvenile Law at the Temple
University Beasley School of Law.
