Photograph of Professor Cynthia Jones

Cynthia Jones

Associate Professor of Law

Office: Room 396
 Phone: 202-274-4416
E-mail: vCard


Professor Jones is an associate law professor at the Washington College of Law. She was hired as a full-time professor in 2004, and received tenure in 2010. She teaches courses in Evidence, Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure, and a seminar on “Race, Crime and Politics.” Recently, Professor Jones received the American University 2011 University Faculty Award for Outstanding Teaching. Professor Jones was also recognized as one the 2011 LexisNexis Technology Leaders in the Classroom for her innovative and creative use of film and other electronic media in her classes. Professor Jones is the writer and executive producer of “Fighting Evidence with Evidence,” an animated short film on the Federal Rules of Evidence for which she was awarded the 2009 Teaching with Technology Award from the American University Center for Teaching Excellence. Prof. Jones currently serves as the Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia (“PDS”) and the Director of the American Bar Association Racial Justice Improvement Project, a program designed to implement policy reforms to remedy racial disparities in the criminal justice system. Professor Jones researches, writes and lectures across the country on the reforms needed to prevent wrongful convictions and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project. Upon graduating from the Washington College of Law, Professor Jones served as a law clerk to the Honorable Frank E. Schwelb of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals and worked as an associate at the law firm of Dickstein, Shapiro and Morin before working as a public defender for five years. Prior to becoming the Executive Director of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia in 2000, Professor Jones was the Deputy Director of the D.C. Pretrial Services Agency.



Areas of Specialization

  • Capital Punishment
  • Evidence
  • Criminal Law

Degrees & Universities

  • J.D., American University Washington College of Law 1989 (magna cum laude)
  • B.A., University of Delaware 1986

  • Selected Publications

    • Cynthia Jones, A Reason to Doubt: The Suppression of Evidence and the Inference of Innocence, 100 J. Crim. Law & Criminology 415 (2010).
    • Cynthia Jones, Mastering Criminal Procedure I (Carolina Press 2010).
    • Cynthia Jones, The Right Remedy for the Wrongly Convicted: Judicial Sanctions for Destruction of DNA Evidence, 77 Fordham L. Rev. 2893 (2009).
    • Cynthia Jones, Evidence Destroyed, Innocence Lost: The Preservation of Biological Evidence under Innocence Protection Statutes, 42 Am. Crim. L. Rev. 1239 (2005).

  • + Selected Presentations