Peter J. Messitte

Adjunct Professor of Law

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Peter J. Messitte is a Senior United States District Judge for the District of Maryland. He is formerly a Judge on the Circuit Court for Montgomery County, Maryland. He graduated with honors from Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts and from the University of Chicago Law School. Judge Messitte was a Peace Corps volunteer in São Paulo, Brazil, from 1966 to 1968. He has been involved in Judicial Reform activities around the world for more than 30 years. His principal consulting work in this regard has taken place in Latin America (mainly Brazil), although it has also extended to Lusophone countries around the world, as well as Turkey, Thailand and Yemen. Judge Messitte is a former member of the International Judicial Relations Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference, where he chaired the Latin American and Caribbean Working Group. He is currently a Council Member of the Rule of Law Initiative for Latin America of the American Bar Association. He has written and spoken widely on Judicial Reform topics in all of these locations and throughout the United States. In 2008, in recognition of his work on judicial reform with the Brazilian Judiciary, he was made an Honorary Citizen of the City of São Paulo.



Areas of Specialization

  • Comparative Law
  • International Law

Degrees & Universities

  • J.D., University of Chicago Law School
  • B.A., Amherst College

  • Selected Publications

    • Peter J. Messitte, Expanding the Rule of Law in Latin America, 4 Wash. U. Global Studies L. Rev. 617 (2005).