Criminal Law

David Dirgo Adjunct Law Professor

David Dirgo is a Career Law Clerk at the Nebraska Supreme Court, U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska.

Martin R. Gardner Steinhart Foundation Professor of Law

Professor Gardner teaches Family Law, Juvenile Law, Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure. He attended the University of Utah and received his B.S. degree in 1969 and his J.D. degree in 1972. He served as Associate Comment Editor for the Utah Law Review. During the 1975-76 academic year, he was a Fellow in Law and the Humanities at Harvard University. He is a member of the state bars of Nebraska and Utah. Professor Gardner was an Instructor at the Indiana University School of Law (Bloomington) during 1972-73 and was on the faculty of the University of Alabama School of Law from 1973-77.

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Michelle Paxton Adjunct Law Professor and Director of the Children's Justice Clinic

Michelle Paxton joined the College of Law in April, 2017 to create and lead the newest clinical program, the Children’s Justice Clinic. Ms. Paxton has served as the Director of Legal Training at University of Nebraska’s Center on Children, Families and the Law (CCFL). She develops curriculum and trains child welfare workers, probation officers, and mental health professionals on all aspects of juvenile court process and procedure in Nebraska. Ms. Paxton also receives Guardian ad Litem appointments from the Lancaster County Juvenile Court.

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Steve Schmidt Associate Professor of Law and Courtesy Associate Professor of Forensic Science

Professor Schmidt joined the faculty in 2007. He received his B.S. degree in 1987 and spent the next eight years as an infantry officer in the United States Marine Corps. He received his M.A. degree in 1994 and his J.D. in 1998. Following law school, he worked in the Lancaster County Attorney's Office. As a Deputy County Attorney, he primarily prosecuted sexual assault and domestic violence cases, but also handled a wide variety of other felony and misdemeanor cases.

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Robert Schopp Robert J. Kutak Professor of Law

Professor Schopp practiced clinical psychology before turning to the study of law and philosophy in an attempt to understand some perplexing issues that he encountered during ten years of clinical practice. So far, he remains perplexed, but he likes to think that he is perplexed in a deeper and more comprehensive manner. He joined the University of Nebraska College of Law in 1989 after completing the concurrent law/philosophy program at the University of Arizona. His primary areas of interest involve questions that lie at the intersection of law, psychology and philosophy.

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Richard L. Wiener Professor of Psychology and Courtesy Professor of Law

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