Biography

Levenson serves on the Board of Directors for Bet Tzedek Legal Services - The House of Justice.

Professor Levenson lectures regularly throughout the country and internationally for the Federal Judicial Center, National Judicial College, international bar associations, bar review courses, community groups and legal societies. She also testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee and the California Legislature regarding SB 490 (Death Penalty). Professor Levenson has been a legal commentator for CBS, CNN, ABC, NBC and NPR. She has commented on a wide range of high-publicity cases, including the O.J. Simpson murder trial, the Rodney King beating trial, the Menendez murder trials, the Michael Jackson molestation case, the Scott Peterson murder trial, the Bernard Madoff investigation, the Clinton impeachment, the Robert Blake murder trial, the trial of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, the prosecution of Anna Nicole Smith's physicians, UCI Medical Scandal, the Death of Conrad Roy as a result of digital suggestion from Michelle Carter, and the prosecution of Dr. Conrad Murray.

Professor Levenson received her J.D. in 1980 from UCLA School of Law and her undergraduate degree from Stanford University in 1977. In law school, she was the Chief Article Editor of the Law Review. After graduation, she clerked for Judge James Hunter, III, of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

Along with Erwin Chemerinsky, she has argued that a "meaningful public trial in the 1990s requires that it be broadcast because few people realistically can attend court proceedings.".

She has written books on California criminal law and is a frequent television commentator on criminal legal issues, first coming to fame as a frequent commentator for CBS in the OJ Simpson trial. She has written about the ethics of being a television commentator.