Andrew Guthrie Ferguson

Andrew Guthrie Ferguson is a national expert on predictive policing, big data policing, and emerging surveillance technologies. He is the author of the new book THE RISE OF BIG DATA POLICING: SURVEILLANCE, RACE, AND THE FUTURE OF LAW ENFORCEMENT (2017). His recent research focuses on studying how new law enforcement technologies distort traditional methods of policing and the related issues of privacy, civil rights, and community safety. Professor Ferguson currently teaches as a tenured full professor at the University of the District of Columbia’s David A. Clarke School of Law where he has been voted “Professor of the Year” four times. His scholarship on the digital transformation of criminal justice has been published in the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, the California Law Review, the Cornell Law Review, the Minnesota Law Review, the Northwestern Law Review, the Boston University Law Review, the University of Southern California Law Review, the Notre Dame Law Review, and the Emory Law Journal among others. In 2017 Professor Ferguson co-authored the law professors’ amicus brief to the Supreme Court on behalf of the Petitioner in Carpenter v. U.S., involving the warrantless collection of cell-site tracking data. Professor Ferguson’s legal commentary has been featured in numerous media outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Economist, CNN, NPR, USA Today, the ABA Journal, The Atlantic (digital), The Huffington Post, and many other national and international newspapers, magazines, and media sites. He is regularly consulted by governments, private industry, local community groups, and civil liberties organizations interested in the future of policing. Prior to joining the law faculty, Professor Ferguson worked as a supervising attorney at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. As a public defender for seven years, he represented adults and juveniles in serious felony cases ranging from homicide to misdemeanor offenses. In addition to participating as lead counsel in numerous jury and bench trials, he argued cases before the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. Before joining the Public Defender Service, Professor Ferguson was awarded the E. Barrett Prettyman Fellowship at the Georgetown Law Center’s Criminal Justice Clinic. For two years as a Prettyman Fellow, he taught and supervised third-year clinical students involved in the criminal justice clinic. Immediately after graduating from law school, he clerked for the Honorable Chief Judge Carolyn Dineen King of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Professor Ferguson holds an LL.M from Georgetown Law Center, a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law (summa cum laude), and a B.A. from Williams College (cum laude).