Danielle C. Jefferis

Schmid Professor for Excellence in Research, Associate Professor of Law

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Professor Danielle Jefferis

Biography

Danielle C. Jefferis is the 2025-26 Schmid Professor for Excellence in Research and an Associate Professor of Law. Her scholarship examines constitutional and civil rights law, federal courts, and the law and policy of prison and detention. She has presented her research at institutions around the world, including Harvard Law School, UCLA School of Law, Hamburg Institute for Social Research, University of Strathclyde, Durham Law School, Queens University (Belfast), Duke University School of Law, Utrecht University, and others. She has provided expert commentary on prison and detention issues for national and international media outlets, including VICE, Mother Jones, Bolts Mag, and NowThis, and has been solicited as an amicus curiae for cases involving prison law and prisoners’ rights in courts around the country. 

Professor Jefferis’s scholarship is informed by her unique teaching and practice experience, which lie at the intersection of constitutional and civil rights law, immigration law, and federal courts. She has extensive civil rights litigation experience and has represented plaintiffs in federal courts across the country, including in the U.S. Supreme Court. She has taken cases to trial and litigated numerous appeals. In 2018, she was a member of a team of clinic faculty and student attorneys that successfully challenged the constitutionality of a federal prisoner’s convictions, resulting in his release from prison. One of her most memorable moments as an attorney and teacher was witnessing her client reunite with his family after being separated from them for more than a decade. 

Prior to joining the Nebraska Law faculty, Professor Jefferis taught at California Western School of Law in San Diego and in the Civil Rights Clinic at the University of Denver College of Law. Before entering academic, she was the Nadine Strossen Fellow with the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project in New York and an associate attorney with a boutique civil rights firm in Colorado. Professor Jefferis clerked for the now-retired Honorable Gale T. Miller of the Colorado Court of Appeals. 

Courses

  • Civil Procedure 
    An introduction to the theory and practice of litigation in federal and state courts. Topics studied include jurisdiction, pleading, joinder, discovery, motion practice, the right to jury trial, trial and post-trial motions, appellate review and preclusion doctrine.
  • Advanced Civil Procedure (in development)
  • Civil Rights Litigation 729/G
    This is a three-credit introductory study of American civil rights law with a focus on general civil rights enforcement against government actors. In this course, we will examine the primary sources of law defining “civil rights,” the means by which a plaintiff may litigate a civil rights claim against individuals and entities, and the limitations and defenses that may be available to a party defending against such a claim. You will study the doctrine of constitutional tort law as applied to state and federal actors, civil rights limitations and defenses like absolute and qualified immunity, supervisory and municipal liability, the enforcement of certain statutory rights, available remedies, and matters of institutional reform or “impact litigation.” We recommend taking Constitutional Law II before or alongside this course.
  • Race & the Law 664R
    This is a three-credit seminar examining the intersection of race and the law and, specifically, the role that law has played and continues to play in the oppression, subordination, and promotion of people and groups based on race. We will anchor our studies with a look at the historical periods involving slavery, the Civil War, the First Reconstruction, the Jim Crow era, and the Civil Rights Movement and Second Reconstruction, before examining contemporary issues of race in areas of the law such as land use, education, employment, policing, punishment, and elections. Enrollment limit 15.
  • Prison Law 629
    Introductory study of the law of confinement in the United States and the rights of incarcerated people. The landscape of incarceration in America, the governing legal framework of the American prison system with respect to people in custody, and the theoretical underpinnings of incarceration policy is examined. Discuss issues of racial, gender, and economic justice; equity; fairness; and power. Analyze and critique the system as it functions in the context of real cases and hypotheticals derived from real cases.
Articles
Book Chapters
Presentations
  • Presenter, “Our Progressively Brutal Constitution,” Incarceration Law Roundtable, UCLA School of Law, Los Angeles, California (April 4-5, 2025).
  • Presenter, “Brutal By Design,” AALS Section on Criminal Law, AALS Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California (January 11, 2025).
  • Presenter/Moderator, “The Future of Civil Rights Enforcement,” AALS Section on Civil Rights, AALS Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California (January 10, 2025).
  • Presenter, “Our Progressively Brutal Constitution,” AALS Section on Constitutional Law, AALS Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California (January 8, 2025).
  • Presenter, “Our Progressively Brutal Constitution,” Constituting Transformation Workshop, Hamburg Institute for Social Research, Hamburg, Germany (November 20-22, 2024).
  • Presenter, “Claims for Monetary Damages,” Prison Law and Advocates Conference, Georgia State University College of Law, Atlanta, Georgia (October 19, 2024). 
  • Presenter, “Border Spaces, Insecurity, and Identity,” British Society of Criminology Conference, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland/United Kingdom (July 8, 2024).
  • Presenter, “Border Spaces, Insecurity, and Identity,” Society of Legal Scholars Collaborative Workshop, Durham Law School, Durham, United Kingdom (June 20, 2024). 
  • Presenter, “Border Spaces, Insecurity, and Identity,” 15th Irish North/South Criminology Conference, Queens University, Belfast, Northern Ireland/United Kingdom (June 18, 2024).
  • Presenter, “The Prison Penalty,” Law and Society Association Annual Meeting, Denver, Colorado (June 6-9, 2024).
  • Presenter, “The Prison Penalty,” University of Kansas School of Law, Lawrence, Kansas (April 4, 2024).
  • Speaker, “My Leadership Moment,” Women Lead 2024, Lincoln, Nebraska (March 1, 2024). 
  • Work in Progress, “The Prison Penalty,” Faculty Friday Workshop, University of Nebraska College of Law, Lincoln, Nebraska (February 2, 2024).
  • Work in Progress, “‘The Worst of the Worst:’ Civil Rights Cases and the Effect of Supermax Rhetoric on Judicial Decision-Making,” AALS Section on Law and Social Sciences, AALS Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C. (January 3-6, 2024).
Other
  • Smith v. Ward, No. 21-1405 (U.S., June 6, 2022)(solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of legal scholars who study the treatment of incarcerated people under the U.S. Constitution and other federal law in support of petition for writ of certiorari filed in the U.S. Supreme Court concerning the p
  • Herrera v. Cleveland, et al., No. 21-771 (U.S., Dec. 27, 2021) (solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of civil procedure scholars in support of petition for writ of certiorari filed in the U.S. Supreme Court concerning the proper interpretation of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15 as applied to “John Doe” def
  • Strain v. Regalado, et al., No. 20-1562 (U.S., June 10, 2021) (solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of legal scholars who teach and write on incarceration, criminal justice, civil rights, and constitutional law in support of petition for writ of certiorari filed in the U.S. Supreme Court concerning the prope
  • Jones v. DeSantis, No. 20-12003 (11th Cir., August 3, 2020) (solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of law professors across the country who research, teach, and write on issues of constitutional and criminal law, asserting that the district court acted within its sound discretion to enjoin the State of Flor
  • Prison Legal News v. Federal Bureau of Prisons, No. 18-1486 (10th Cir., March 14, 2019) (solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of prisoners’ rights experts arguing for faithful application of voluntary-cessation exception to mootness doctrine in light of Buckhannon Bd. and Care Home, Inc. v. W.V. Dep’t of Health and Human Res. (2001))
  • Rivera v. U.S.A, et al., No. 1:17-cv-5103 (S.D.N.Y., March 1, 2019) (solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of prisoners’ rights experts arguing for application of Bivens doctrine to prisoner-plaintiff’s claim against Bureau of Prisons officials of inadequate medical care).
  • Prison Legal News v. Secretary, Fla. Dep’t of Corrections, No. 18-355 (U.S., Oct. 19, 2018) solicited to serve as amicus curiae on brief of law professors arguing for reinterpretation of Turner v. Safley and deference afforded to prison officials under First Amendment).
Awards

Schmid Professorship for Excellence in Research (2025-26) 

Schmid Professorship for Excellence in Research (2024-25)

College Distinguished Teaching Award (2024-25)

Rev. Dr. Michael W. Combs Memorial Fund for Scholars of Equity and Justice Award (2024)

Media

Education

  • PhD (School of Law & Criminology, Maynooth University, expected 2026)
  • JD (Georgetown University Law Center, 2012)
  • BA (New York University, 2007)

Areas of Expertise

Appointments

  • Associate Professor of Law, 2025
  • Assistant Professor of Law, 2022
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