Virginia Mary Kendall - Legal Career and Service

Legal Career and Service

Following law school graduation, she worked as a law clerk for the Honorable George Michael Marovich at the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois from 1992 - 1995. After her position as law clerk, Kendall became an adjunct professor at her alma mater, Loyola University School of Law, where she continues to teach. She also teaches trial practice and a child exploitation seminar as an adjunct professor at Northwestern University School of Law. Before being appointed to the Federal Bench, Kendall was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the US Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois from 1995 to 2005. While she was a federal prosecutor, she served as Deputy Chief in the Criminal Division, Child Exploitation Coordinator, and Coordinator of Project Safe Neighborhoods. She also served on the United States’ Attorney General’s National Advisory Committee responsible for reviewing all nationwide child exploitation investigations. She currently serves as the co-chair of the American Bar Association Litigation Section’s Jury Innovations Committee and has served in the past as the co-chair of the Section’s Human Trafficking Committee.

She has traveled to Nairobi, Kenya several times where she has trained investigators, trial attorneys, and judges how to effectively use the recently-enacted Kenyan public corruption laws and sexual offense laws. She has lectured at Cornell University on human trafficking as part of the Avon Global Center for Women and Justice, served as a delegate to the Vital Voices Global Partnership to End Violence Against Women international summit, and spoken at the Inaugural Conference of the Avon Global Center’s Symposium on Post Conflict Violence Against Women. She has traveled to Zambia, Liberia and Cyprus to teach judges there about crimes against women and human trafficking through the State Department and Lawyers Without Borders. She is the author of a number of articles concerning exploitation and trafficking, including Greasing the Palm: An Argument for an Increased Focus on Public Corruption in the Fight Against International Human Trafficking, 44 Cornell Int'l L.J. 33 (2011).