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Leo Katz

Frank Carano Professor of Law

Leo Katz

Leo Katz’s work focuses on criminal law and legal theory more generally. By connecting criminal law, moral philosophy and the theory of social choice, he tries to shed light on some of the most basic building block notions of the law—coercion, deception, consent, and the use and abuse of legal stratagems, among others. Continue reading… Leo Katz’s work focuses on criminal law and legal theory more generally. By connecting criminal law, moral philosophy and the theory of social choice, he tries to shed light on some of the most basic building block notions of the law—coercion, deception, consent, and the use and abuse of legal stratagems, among others. Katz is the author of several books: Bad Acts and Guilty Minds: Conundrums of the Criminal Law (University of Chicago, 1987); Ill-Gotten Gains: Evasion, Blackmail, Fraud and Kindred Puzzles of the Law (University of Chicago, 1996); and most recently Why the Law Is So Perverse (University of Chicago, 2011), which he researched with the support of a Guggenheim Fellowship. Together with Stephen Morse and Michael Moore, he edited Foundations of the Criminal Law (Oxford, 1999).

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Expertise

  • Criminal Law
  • Corporations
  • Jurisprudence

Books

WHY THE LAW IS SO PERVERSE (Univ. of Chicago Press, 2011).

FOUNDATIONS OF THE CRIMINAL LAW, ed. with Stephen Morse and Michael Moore (New York: Oxford University Press 1999).
[Available Here]

Articles and Book Chapters

A Theory of Loopholes, 39 J. LEGAL STUD. 1 (2010).
[Available Here]

Some Memories and Some Ideas, YEARBOOK OF THE WISSENSCHAFTSKOLLEG OF BERLIN (forthcoming, 2009).

Complicity and the Murderous Judge, in CRIMINAL LAW STORIES (R. Weissberg ed., 2008).

Contrived Defenses and Deterrent Threats: Two Facets of One Problem, 5 OHIO ST. J. CRIM. L. 479 (2008) (with Claire Finkelstein).

In Defense of Tax Shelters, 26 VA. TAX REV. 799 (2007).

Choice, Consent and Cycling:The Hidden Limitations of Consent, 104 MICH. L. REV. 627 (2006).

The Prerequisites of Responsibility: Comments on Antony Duff, 2 OHIO ST. J. CRIM. L. 463 (2005).

Before and After: Temporal Anomalies in Legal Doctrine, 151 U. PA. L. REV. 863 (2003).

What to Compensate? Some Surprisingly Unappreciated Reasons Why the Problem Is So Hard, 40 U. SAN DIEGO L. REV. 1345, symposium on Harms, Baselines and Counterfactuals (2003).

Justification and Harm in Negligence, 4 THEORETICAL INQUIRY L. 397 (2003).

Duress, in ENCYCLOPEDIA OF CRIME AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE (MacMillan Press 2002).

Villainy and Felony: A Problem Concerning Criminaliztion, 6 BUFF. CRIM. L. REV. 451 (2003).

Comments on Scott Shapiro, in 1 LEGAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY 217 (Enrique Villanueva ed., 2002).

Villainy and Felony, 6 BUFF. CRIM. L. REV. 100, Symposium on "The New Culpability" (2002).

Preempting oneself: the right and the duty to forestall one's own wrongdoing, 5 LEGAL THEORY 339 (1999).

ILL-GOTTEN GAINS: EVASION, BLACKMAIL, FRAUD AND KINDRED PUZZLES OF THE LAW (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1996).
[Available Here]

BAD ACTS AND GUILTY MINDS: CONUNDRUMS OF THE CRIMINAL LAW (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1987).
[Available Here]

More publications can be found here.

Research Areas

  • Criminal Law
  • Corporate Law
  • Law and Moral Theory

Positions

Penn Law - Frank Carano Professor of Law (2005- ); Professor of Law (1991-2005)

University of Michigan Law School - Assistant Professor (1987-91)

Fellow, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (2007-08)

Mayer, Brown and Platt - Associate (1984-87)

Visiting - Australian National University, RSSS; Berkeley (Guggenheim fellowship for work in criminal law theory); Goethe Universitat, Frankfurt

Law Clerk to the Hon. Anthony M. Kennedy, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

Courses

  • Criminal Law
  • Contracts
  • Corporations
  • Law and Morality

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