Daniel Sheehan is a Harvard College, Law School and Divinity School-trained constitutional lawyer. He is a veteran of more than a dozen landmark American civil rights cases (See Dan’s biography) He has served as chief counsel, chief trial counsel, associate trial counsel, director of civil discovery and director of investigations in numerous precedent-setting cases. Daniel has also served as “of counsel” in a number of additional constitutional appellate cases before the United States Supreme Court and federal courts of appeals.

Daniel Sheehan is able to provide a range of legal services, including:

• • Acting as Legal Consultant, Trial Consultant, and Strategist
  • Directing Public Interest Investigations
  • Conducting Civil Discovery
  • Providing Press Interviews
  • Serving as Mock Trial Counsel or Judge
  • Analyzing Public Interest Cases

Dan is also available to initiate and supervise extraordinary cases when the legal issues and public interest potential of such cases align with his interests and skills. He is particularly troubled by the current executive, legislative and judicial “rollbacks” of eighty years of progressive gains made by our American people and he is, therefore, available to work with others to develop comprehensive political strategies that will lead to a healthier balance of power throughout our American legal system.

Please contact Daniel if you want to explore the possibility of contracting him for any of the above services. You can also read more about these services below.

Legal Consultant, Trial Consultant, and Strategist

Attorney Daniel Sheehan has acted as legal consultant to a wide range of individuals and organizations. He has the ability to quickly analyze the appropriate application of various laws, determine the relevant need for fact gathering and investigative action, and develop the best strategic plan for success.

Daniel has been a trial consultant to younger and less experienced trial attorneys, has consulted with law school professors and appellate attorneys on the US Constitution, and has served as a legal strategist to individuals with various legal challenges. Here are a few examples of questions he has addressed:

Public Interest Investigations

Dan is nationally known for initiating and leading high-profile public interest investigations in numerous famous civil rights cases. These include: The Karen Silkwood Case in Oklahoma; The American Sanctuary Movement Case in Brownsville, Texas; the Greensboro Civil Rights Massacre in North Carolina; the First Degree Murder Defense of Tchula, Mississippi Mayor Eddie Carthan and the Iran-Contra Case which entailed investigations both throughout the United States and Latin America.

Dan has over forty-four years of experience working with and directing licensed professional investigators in first-degree murder cases, federal civil rights conspiracies, corporate violations of civil rights, racially and religiously motivated hate crimes and many other forms of private and public criminal activity.

Civil Discovery

For more than forty-four years, Dan has been one of America’s preeminent trial attorneys, having served as chief trial counsel in cases in 26 States. During that time he has supervised and conducted the civil discovery phase of numerous cases. He is particularly experienced at:

• Integrating private professional field investigative data with document demands from public and corporate defendants
• Interviewing potential witnesses
• Conducting official oral depositions of witnesses for both the plaintiff and defense
• Working with journalists and public relations professionals to generate the visibility, public support, and financial support that such cases often require

Press Interviews

Having served as the chief spokesperson for the plaintiffs in such well-known cases as: the American Sanctuary Movement Case; the Karen Silkwood Case; The Three Mile Island Case and the Iran Contra case – all of which generated widespread national news media attention. Dan is available to serve as the press relations spokesperson in important civil rights and public justice cases. He pioneered the right of American news journalists to protect their confidential news sources and successfully represented The New York Times in the Pentagon Papers Case. Dan strongly believes in “the people’s right to know”.

Serving as Mock Trial Counsel or Judge

During his forty-year legal career, Daniel has avoided becoming involved in mock trials of significant public issues, instead focusing on initiating and prosecuting actual cases seeking to address – and successfully resolve – those issues. However, now that Dan is entering a new phase of his career, during which he is putting greater emphasis on teaching, writing, public speaking and consulting on other cases, Dan is available to serve as either trial counsel or judge in responsibly-conducted mock trials on issues of significant public interest.

Public Interest Case Analysis

Dan has evaluated and analyzed hundreds of potential public interest legal cases and public organizing projects during his career as general counsel for the National Office of Social Ministry for The American Jesuit Order; as chief trial counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union in the Rocky Mountain States and as president, general counsel and chief trial attorney for the Christic Institute in Washington, D.C. and the Romero Institute in California. Dan recommended taking to trial many of the cases he has prosecuted only after conducting a thorough factual, legal, and financial analysis of their potential public interest impact. He disapproved many more cases due to their failure to “pass muster” with regard to one or more of these critical criteria. Dan is, therefore, available to assist public interest organizations, attorneys or individual plaintiffs interested in bringing public interest suits by conducting a feasibility analysis of the potential cases or projects involved.