A.B., Harvard University
J.D., LL.M., Columbia University

Advanced Topics in Criminal Law
Criminal Law
Criminal Procedure I
Criminal Procedure II
Law and Economics
Torts

Professor Dillof currently teaches Torts, Criminal Law, and Criminal Procedure. In the past, he has taught Civil Rights and Jurisprudence. These classes complement his scholarly interest in exploring the forms of justice that underlie our civil, criminal, and constitutional law systems.

Professor Dillof earned a B.A. in philosophy from Harvard University.  At Columbia University School of Law, he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and a member of the law review.  He worked at the Center for Law in the Public Interest in Los Angeles before taking a position as a law clerk for the Honorable William C. Canby, a judge on the United States Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  He then served as special legal assistant for the Immigration Law Task Force of the American Civil Liberties Union, where he was responsible for drafting a lawyers’ guide to the Immigration Reform and Control Act.

Professor Dillof later joined the New York City Law Department, Office of the Corporation Counsel.  There, as a member of the General Litigation Division, he handled a wide range of civil matters including civil rights, employment, education, homeless, and class-action litigation.  In the Environmental Division, he was involved in high-profile law suits involving challenges to New York City’s recycling, solid waste disposal, and sewage treatment programs.  As a member of the Appeal Division, he argued many cases before state and federal appellate courts.  These appeals concerned the scope of municipal tort liability, first amendment issues, standards of attorney misconduct, and matters of substantive criminal law.

In 1994, Professor Dillof was selected as one of only three participants in Columbia University School of Law’s Associate of Law fellowship program. The program is designed to provide training for prospective law teachers.  During the two-year fellowship, Professor Dillof developed curriculum and taught Legal Writing and Research.  Based on his research on hate crime laws, he was awarded a master of laws degree from Columbia in 1996. He subsequently joined the faculty at Texas Wesleyan University School of Law where he coached the school's moot court team and organized a student chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and a Pro Bono Criminal Law Project.  In 1999, he was a visiting professor at Washington and Lee University School of Law.  Since 2002, he was been a member of the faculty of Wayne State University Law School.

Professor Dillof has published articles in many of the nation's leading law journals.  These articles include:

        Doomed Steamers and Thin Skulls: The Problem of Preempted Innocent Risks in Torts

        Modal Retributivism: A Theory of Sanctions for Attempts and Other Criminal Wrongs 

        Unraveling Unlawful Entrapment

        Unraveling Unknowing Justification 

        Putting Hate in Its Place: The Codification of Bias Crime Statutes in a Modern Penal Code   

        Transferred Intent: An Inquiry Into the Nature of Criminal Culpability

        Punishing Bias: An Examination of the Theoretical Foundations of Bias Crime Statutes

Professor Dillof's interests outside of law include chess, aerogami, book collecting, and the performative aspects of contemporary popular music.