Tom Durkin's biography :
Tom Durkin is a nationally known trial lawyer specializing in the defense of complex federal criminal matters, with a special emphasis on the defense of prosecutions involving national security and domestic terrorism related matters. Mr. Durkin was selected by the American Civil Liberties Union as one of five lawyers nationwide to participate in its John Adams Project, which provided civilian defense counsel in the case of U.S. v. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, et al., the initial 9/11 conspiracy prosecution in the Military Commissions at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He has been admitted by the U.S. Department of Defense to the Pool of Qualified Civilian Defense Counsel to Practice Before the Military Commissions, and presently serves on the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyer’s Select Committee on National Security. For the past several years Mr. Durkin and his firm have defended a number of individuals charged in high profile and controversial domestic terrorism and national security related cases in federal courts throughout the United States, as well as the celebrated NATO 3 terrorism prosecution in the Circuit Court of Cook County.
Mr. Durkin is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and is a Distinguished Practitioner in Residence at Loyola University Chicago School of Law, where he lectures on National Security Law and serves as Co-Founder and Co-Director of its National Security and Civil Rights Program. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Center on National Security at Fordham University Law School. In November of 2019 he was awarded The Lifetime Achievement Award by the Illinois Attorneys for Criminal Justice.
Mr. Durkin was a Law Clerk to the Honorable James B. Parsons of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois from 1973 to 1974, and served as an Assistant United States Attorney in Chicago from 1978 to 1984. He is a partner in the Chicago law firm of Durkin & Roberts. For further information, please refer to: www.durkinroberts.com.
