Paul Hoffman (Schonbrun DeSimone Seplow Harris & Hoffman, LLP) will speak on "Litigating International Human Rights" at the Social Justice Workshop on

Thursday, November 1, 2007 from 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.  The workshop takes place in the Wiegand room in the Arts & Sciences Building on the Santa Clara University campus. A reception will follow the lecture in the Strong Common Room in Bergin Hall.

Mr. Paul Hoffman is a leading human rights lawyer.  His practice has been in the areas of constitutional and civil rights litigation, including First Amendment, discrimination and privacy litigation, and general business litigation; including copyright and trademark litigation. He also specializes in civil and criminal appeals.

In October 1998, The Daily Journal named Mr. Hoffman one of the 100 most influential attorneys in California and in February 1999 one of the top trial lawyers in Los Angeles County by the Los Angeles Business Journal. From 1984 to 1994, he directed the legal program of the ACLU in Southern California supervising ten staff attorneys and more than 100 volunteer attorneys with a docket of approximately 150-200 pending cases in every area of civil liberties and civil rights practice. In addition, he litigated a full docket of civil liberties/civil rights cases. He specialized in cases involving First Amendment rights, police misconduct, privacy, AIDS discrimination, international human rights, criminal justice and the death penalty. 

Mr. Hoffman was lead plaintiffs counsel in Doe v. Unocal and is lead plaintiffs attorney in the Bridgestone/Firestone litigation regarding allegations of workers rights violations on the company’s Liberian rubber plantations. 

Mr. Hoffman received his JD from New York University, his MS from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and his BA from City College of the City University of New York.