Lisa Lorish

Lisa Lorish teaches Criminal Defense at the Law School. She is an assistant federal public defender for the Western District of Virginia.

Lorish graduated cum laude from Princeton University in 2003 and from the University of Virginia School of Law in 2008, where she was an Order of the Coif member, the essays development editor for the “Virginia Law Review,” a John M. Olin Scholar in Law and Economics and a 2008 recipient of the Raven Award.   

After graduating in 2008, Lorish practiced commercial litigation with Sullivan and Cromwell in London. She then joined the Charlottesville office of McGuireWoods as a litigation associate in 2011, and was named a 2013 Virginia Super Lawyers Rising Star. 

In 2014, Lorish joined the Federal Public Defender's Office for the Western District, where she represents indigent clients charged with federal crimes. She has represented indigent defendants at the trial level and has also argued several appeals before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Lorish is a member of the board of directors of the Fountain Fund, a nonprofit that provides low-interest loans to formerly incarcerated individuals. She is also president of the Charlottesville Albemarle Bar Association and a member of the Virginia State Bar Special Committee on the Future of Law Practice