Paul Cassell

Paul G. Cassell is the Ronald N. Boyce Presidential Professor of Criminal Law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law, University of Utah (332 S. 1400 E., Salt Lake City, UT 84112). Before returning to academia, he served as a United States District Judge for the District of Utah from 2002 to 2007 — an Article III appointment — before resigning his judgeship to resume full-time law teaching and scholarship. As a federal judge, Cassell issued one of the earliest rulings applying the Crime Victims' Rights Act (CVRA), 18 U.S.C. § 3771, to pre-charging situations in United States v. Heaton — a ruling later cited by Judge Richard Berman from the bench during the August 2019 SDNY hearing at which the Epstein indictment was dismissed (EFTA00019994). He is a co-author of a leading law school casebook, Beloof, Cassell & Twist, Victims in Criminal Procedure (3d ed. 2010), and has litigated crime victims' rights matters before federal courts nationwide, including the United States Supreme Court (Paroline v. United States, 134 S. Ct. 1710 (2014)). He is co-author, with Brad Edwards, of "Relentless Pursuit: My Fight for the Victims of Jeffrey Epstein" (2020). Cassell entered the Epstein litigation after Brad Edwards began representing the first victims in 2008. He joined as co-counsel on the landmark Crime Victims' Rights Act case — Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2 v. United States, Case No. 08-80736-Civ-Marra (S.D. Fla.) — which challenged the constitutionality of the 2007 Non-Prosecution Agreement on the grounds that the DOJ had concealed it from victims in violation of their statutory rights. Court filings confirm Cassell's institutional address as the S.J. Quinney College of Law and his admission to the case pro hac vice (EFTA01657803, EFTA01387837). An internal DOJ memorandum from AUSA Dexter Lee dated February 2011 describes in detail Cassell's litigation strategy — including his December 2010 meeting with U.S. Attorney Ferrer in which Cassell presented a four-page letter alleging improper influence, a tip-off to Epstein of a search warrant, and unprecedented secrecy between the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office (EFTA00208572). That memo records that Cassell's request for an OPR investigation was referred to DOJ OPR on December 16, 2010. The CVRA case ran over a decade and produced Judge Kenneth Marra's February 2019 ruling that the government had violated victims' rights under the CVRA — the first judicial finding to crack the legal framework protecting Epstein. Cassell also represented Virginia Giuffre (Jane Doe 3) in the Giuffre v. Maxwell civil litigation in the Southern District of New York (Case No. 15-cv-07433), where Ghislaine Maxwell unsuccessfully moved to disqualify him (EFTA01182947). In January 2015, Cassell contacted the USAO-SDFL and the FBI directly seeking protection for a victim whose home in Colorado had been broken into, asserting he believed Epstein or his associates were responsible (EFTA01660359). Cassell was also named as opposing counsel by Alan Dershowitz in threatened disbarment proceedings after Cassell and Edwards filed a motion in January 2015 naming Dershowitz and Prince Andrew as alleged abusers — coverage confirmed in multiple SDNY-produced news clips (EFTA01368193).