DeanRose DiMartino and Karen Sue Smith Professor of Law
J.D. Harvard Law School A.B. Harvard College
Jelani Jefferson Exum is the Law School’s Dean and Rose DiMartino and Karen Sue Smith Professor of Law.
Dean Jefferson Exum started at St. John’s Law in June 2024 after serving as the Dean and Philip J. McElroy Professor of Law at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law. Before joining the faculty at Detroit Mercy, she was a professor at the University of Toledo College of Law and at the University of Kansas School of Law. She also taught as a visiting professor at the University of Michigan Law School and as a fellow at Tulane Law School. At Toledo Law, she was the school’s inaugural Associate Dean for Diversity and Inclusion. At Detroit Mercy, the students honored her as Professor of the Year.
Prior to her academic career, Dean Jefferson Exum earned her undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Harvard College, received a J.D. from Harvard Law School, and held federal clerkships with Hon. Eldon E. Fallon, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, and Hon. James L. Dennis, U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit. As a law professor, she has taught Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure Investigations, Criminal Sentencing, and Race and American Law, among other courses. Her scholarly work on comparative criminal law and procedure, policing, and the impact of race on criminal justice has appeared in a range of publications.
Outside the academy, Dean Jefferson Exum has served as a member of the editorial board of the Federal Sentencing Reporter and chaired the advisory board for the Neighborhood Defender Service of Detroit.