Applicants for Law Clerk Positions

Description:
Summer

Each summer, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland hires 10-14 law students to serve as volunteer law clerks during the summer in our Baltimore office, which is located across the street from the federal courthouse in downtown Baltimore. The Office will also hire 4-6 volunteer law clerks each summer for our office in Greenbelt, located across the street from the federal courthouse in Greenbelt, Maryland (right outside of Washington, DC).

Fall & Spring Semesters

During the fall and spring school terms, the Office will employ 8-10 law clerks in Baltimore and 2-5 law clerks in Greenbelt. Law clerks serve on a volunteer basis a couple days each week, and the specific schedules are arranged as needed to accommodate individual clerks’ class and extracurricular commitments. At certain schools, students may participate in the clerkship in connection with a course and earn credits toward graduation.

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For both summer and semester-term clerks, the legal assignments are highly substantive and often involve research and writing. Specific assignments are distributed based on the interests of the clerks and the needs of the office in an effort to expose each clerk to a variety of substantive matters ranging from health care fraud to gang prosecutions, from motions to suppress evidence to disputes at sentencing.

Clerks in the Baltimore office typically work on both criminal and civil matters, while Greenbelt clerks work exclusively on criminal matters. The office seeks to give all students extensive opportunities to contribute to and observe firsthand depositions, motion hearings, trials, and, on occasion, appellate arguments. Students may be eligible for federal work study programs or for public service grants from their law school.

In addition, the Office organizes a series of programs specifically for the law clerks. These events have included trips to the police firing range to learn firearm safety and practice shooting real weapons, including machine guns and sniper rifles, as well as to the FBI training facility in Quantico, Virginia, to use a computerized firearms training simulator. Speakers have included Fourth Circuit Judges Diana Gribbon Motz and Paul V. Niemeyer, District Judge Marvin Garbis, District Judge and former U.S. Attorney Richard Bennett, Magistrate Judge Beth Gesner, and Federal Public Defender James Wyda.

Last Update 03/05/2013