John  O.  Woodruff , JD

Professor of Law; Chair, Legal Studies Department

Department: Legal Studies
Location: 25 Emerson

Degrees

BA, University of Colorado at Boulder; JD, Antioch School of Law

Contact

Phone: 413.565.1238
Fax: 413.565.1131
Email: jwoodruff@baypath.edu

Profile

John Woodruff, JD, professor of law and chair of the legal studies department since 2005, began teaching in the legal studies department at Bay Path College in 1998. As chair of the American Bar Association-approved legal studies program, Professor Woodruff works with students majoring in legal studies and forensic studies who are looking forward to careers in law and law-related professions, either as paralegals or attorneys, or in some application of forensics and law. Professor Woodruff also works with students from many other majors, including forensic science, criminal justice, psychology, business and accounting who are interested in adding coursework in legal studies to their degrees. He also serves as chair of Bay Path’s Committee on Academic Integrity, the pre-law advisor and advisor to the Bay Path Law Club.

Woodruff brings a wealth of legal experience to his classes at Bay Path. In a legal career that spans 25 years he has worked as a staff public defender in Maryland and Massachusetts, representing juveniles and adults in felony and misdemeanor cases, and worked on post-conviction issues in death penalty cases in Maryland. He served the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office as the senior prosecutor for the four western counties of Massachusetts, handling cases in a wide variety of criminal and civil areas, including white collar crime, public integrity, consumer protection, and civil rights. He was the first Assistant Attorney General in Western Massachusetts to be appointed as a Special Assistant United States Attorney to work on joint, state-federal investigations and prosecutions. Professor Woodruff also served as the assistant director and legal policy director for Georgetown University’s Children and Youth-At-Risk Project, which provided technical assistance to forms of national and state public policy on issues affecting youth at risk for HIV infection and homelessness.

He has a long-standing commitment to excellence in women’s education. Before joining the Bay Path faculty full time, Professor Woodruff taught European, American and Asian history at a private, all-girls’ high school in Simsbury, CT, where he also served as a college counselor and advisor to several student organizations including SADD and the Asian Club. As an Assistant Attorney General, Woodruff supervised Bay Path interns working on criminal, consumer protection, civil rights, and public integrity cases. He has two daughters, both of whom attended all-women’s colleges.

A graduate of the Antioch School of Law in Washington, D.C., Professor Woodruff teaches courses in criminal law and procedure, evidence, constitutional law, and interdisciplinary courses law and society, and law and literature. He has also taught at the University of Connecticut’s Neag Graduate School of Education, judged moot court and mock trials at the American University Law School, and presented at numerous national and international conferences and meetings. Woodruff earned a Bachelor of Arts in history from the University of Colorado, where he also studied geology and fine arts. He is admitted to practice in Maryland and Massachusetts.