Elisabeth Semel joined the Berkeley Law faculty in 2001 after two decades as a criminal and capital defense attorney and four years as the director of the American Bar Association Death Penalty Representation Project in Washington, D.C., including several years as adjunct faculty Georgetown Law.
Semel was the founding director of the Death Penalty Clinic, which she currently co-directs. In that role, she represents clients facing capital punishment at all stages of the proceedings in California and several states in the South. Semel and her students have filed amicus curiae briefs in death penalty cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, including Miller-El v. Cockrell, Miller-El v. Dretke, Snyder v. Louisiana, and Williams v. California (all dealing with race discrimination in jury selection).
In 2020, Semel and several of her students published Whitewashing the Jury Box: How California Perpetuates the Exclusion of Black and Latinx Jurors, which provided the evidentiary support for the California Legislature’s passage of AB 3070. The new statute dramatically reshapes the exercise of peremptory challenges trials to preclude strikes in which implicit or explicit racial or ethnic bias could be a factor. In 2024, Semel and another group of students published Guess Who’s Coming to Jury Duty: How the Failure to Collect Juror Demographic Data Contributes to Whitewashing the Jury Box. The new report catalogues the states that gather prospective jurors’ self-identified race and ethnicity and those that do not. It examines what courts do with the information, including whether it is provided to the court and counsel for use during jury selection, and the consequences of these choices in furthering or obstructing jury representativeness and diversity.
Semel maintains a page, Batson Reform State by State, on the Death Penalty Clinic website that tracks reforms in the use of peremptory challenges. Her publications include Batson and the Discriminatory Use of Peremptory Challenges in the 21st Century in Jurywork: Systematic Techniques (Thomson Reuters, 2023-24 ed.) and Reflections on Justice Stevens’s Concurring Opinion in Baze v. Rees: A Fifth Gregg Justice Renounces Capital Punishment, 43 UC Davis L. Rev. 783 (2010). She has written numerous articles about criminal defense practice and testified before Congress and the California Legislature.
Semel is the recipient of the Berkeley Law Faculty Lifetime Achievement Award (2023), an Honorary Doctor of Laws from Bard College (2016), the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice Lifetime Achievement Award (2019), and the Berkeley Law Rutter Award for Teaching Distinction (2015), among other honors.
Education
B.A., Bard College (1972)
J.D., UC Davis (1975)
Elisabeth Anne Semel is teaching the following courses in Spring 2025:
• 285.3D sec. 001 - Death Penalty Clinic Seminar II
• 295.5D sec. 001 - Death Penalty Clinic
Courses During Other Semesters
| Semester | Course Num | Course Title |  Teaching Evaluations | Fall 2025 | 285.2D sec. 001 | Death Penalty Clinic Seminar I | 295.5D sec. 001 | Death Penalty Clinic | Fall 2024 | 285.2D sec. 001 | Death Penalty Clinic Seminar I | View Teaching Evaluation | 295.5D sec. 001 | Death Penalty Clinic | View Teaching Evaluation |
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Balancing the Scales of Justice
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, discusses the clinic’s recent report, “Whitewashing the Jury Box”, and the long history of stereotypes, often correlated with race, have been consistently used to justify striking jurors
California’s top court weighs overturning hundreds of death penalty sentences
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, discusses Governor Newsom’s written argument – which she co-wrote – calling the death penalty racist and discriminatory against Black and Latino defendants
South Carolina lawmakers vote to add firing squad to execution methods
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, says race is, and it has always been, the most salient feature of the American death penalty
Race & Criminal Justice After the Chauvin Verdict
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, appears on “State of The Bay” to discuss the Derek Chauvin verdict and and how it fits into the context of a criminal justice system that has long been plagued by racial bias
Alameda County’s first Black chief public defender is trying to fix the problem with juries
Information from the Death Penalty Clinic’s report, “Whitewashing the Jury Box” is cited in a column about Brendon Woods, Alameda County’s chief public defender
Rights advocates celebrate but say fight only beginning as Virginia bans death penalty
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, says race is the most salient feature of the American death penalty
Trump administration sets wave of executions for days leading up to Biden inauguration
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, says the Trump DOJ is exploiting executions for political reasons
Berkeley Law Helps Governor Seek More Protections Against Racial Bias in Jury Proceedings
Gov. Gavin Newsom partners with Dean Erwin Chemerinsky and Berkeley Law’s Death Penalty Clinic on a historic amicus brief about racial discrimination’s impact on how capital punishment is imposed in California.
Newsom, California district attorneys seek tighter standards for application of death penalty
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, and Dean Erwin Chemerinsky explain the unprecedented court filing that asserts the state’s death penalty law is applied in a racist manner against African Americans
Change-Making at the Capitol: Governor Signs Seven Bills Driven by Berkeley Law Clinics and Centers
Governor Newsom signs a whopping seven bills that focus on protecting residents’ civil, financial, and environmental rights — all driven by Berkeley Law clinics and centers.
Vision Quest: Charting a Path Forward for Berkeley Law’s Transformative Clinical Program
A change in leadership of Berkeley Law’s clinics arrives as the thriving program welcomes its biggest class of in-house students and solidifies plans to expand.
Editorial: Attack racism in California’s criminal proceedings
The LA Times Editorial Board calls for the passing of AB 3070, a bill that addresses discrimination in jury selection, and points to Berkeley Law’s Death Penalty Clinic’s report, “Whitewashing the Jury Box” to support the need for action
When Can A Juror Say Black Lives Matter?
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, explains why Batson process isn’t working on the state level, as prosecutors use Black Lives Matter to exclude black people from juries
Letter: Story on Peremptory Challenge Bill was Inaccurate, Unbalanced
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, along with AJ Kutchins and Brendon Woods, writes that the time for waiting is over and the California Legislature must pass AB3070
A Conversation on How Race and America’s Criminal Justice System Are Inextricably Linked
Two Berkeley Law professors and two other UC Berkeley scholars describe how race has created different forms of criminal justice in the U.S.
Report finds ongoing ‘whitewashing’ in California jury selection
Coverage of “Whitewashing the Jury Box”, the Death Penalty Clinic report that found California prosecutors disproportionately strike people of color, especially African-Americans, from serving on juries
New study highlights issues of systemic bias in jury selection
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, discusses “Whitewashing the Jury Box”, the report she co-authored that found California prosecutors disproportionately strike people of color, especially African-Americans, from serving on juries
Op-Ed: The pandemic, the killing of George Floyd and discriminatory jury selection
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, writes that AB 3070 is about addressing enduring, pervasive racial and ethnic inequities
In California, Jury Boxes ‘Whitewashed’ All Too Often
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, discusses a the new report she co-authored that found California prosecutors disproportionately strike people of color, especially African-Americans, from serving on juries
Study: Prosecutors Strike Black and Latino People from Juries
Professor Elisabeth Semel, Director of the Death Penalty Clinic, discusses a the new report she co-authored that found California prosecutors disproportionately strike people of color, especially African-Americans, from serving on juries