American lawyer
Wendy Murphy (born August 13, 1961)[1] is a lawyer specializing in child abuse and interpersonal violence.[2]
Education
Murphy received a BA from Boston College in 1983[3] and became a Juris Doctor from New England Law Boston in 1987.[4]
Career
Murphy began her career as a prosecutor in Middlesex County, handling legal cases related to child abuse and sex crime. Then, she switched to her private practice to focus on violence against women and children.[2] Murphy is an adjunct professor of sexual violence law at New England Law Boston.[5] Murphy was a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School from 2002 to 2003. Earlier, she taught Reproductive Rights and Technologies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[6] She is the founder and director of the Victim Advocacy & Research Group, which is a volunteer legal advocacy organization that, since 1992, has provided free legal services to victims in the criminal justice system.[6]
She successfully sued both Princeton University and Harvard Law School for violating Title IX regulations “by mishandling sexual assault complaints.”[7]
Of the case against Harvard Law School, she writes:
“The case began when Harvard Law School hired me as a consultant in early 2010, in connection with a Title IX matter. When I pointed out to Harvard officials that their policies were noncompliant, and they refused to fix them, I filed a complaint with the Office for Civil Rights in which I identified numerous substantive and procedural violations of Title IX that were then in place in the law school’s policy.”[8]
With co-counsel John Williams, she sued Yale University on behalf of Susan Daria Landino (formerly Burhans). This was another Title IX case and the first Jackson v Birmingham case filed by a higher education administrator rather than a sports coach.[9]
When serial child rapist Wayne Chapman was to be released from jail, she represented his victims to keep him in jail.[10] She filed an appeal with the Supreme Judicial Court asking for an emergency injunction preventing his release.[11]
According to author Stuart Taylor, Jr., she is also a supporter of the "guilty-until-proven-innocent" principle in the American judicial system. She was quoted as saying, "I'm really tired of people suggesting that you're somehow un-American if you don't respect the presumption of innocence because you know what that sounds like to a victim? Presumption: You're a liar."[12]
