William & Mary law dean becomes of counsel at McGuireWoods

William & Mary Law School Dean A. Benjamin Spencer is consulting for McGuireWoods as a part-time, of counsel attorney, the law firm announced Thursday.

Spencer, who is also a trustee professor at the law school, will consult with McGuireWoods lawyers and clients on pending legal matters and work on learning initiatives and client development.

“We are delighted to announce this affiliation,” McGuireWoods Managing Partner Tracy Walker said in a statement. “Dean Spencer is a widely regarded legal scholar with unparalleled experience in the area of federal civil procedure.”

Spencer has held professorships and academic appointments at Harvard Law School, University of Chicago Law School, University of Virginia School of Law, Washington & Lee University School of Law and others.

Spencer graduated as valedictorian of his class at Morehouse College before earning a master’s degree from the London School of Economics as a Marshall Scholar. He received his law degree from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor for the Harvard Law Review.

Spencer clerked for Judge Judith W. Rogers on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and worked as an associate at Shearman & Sterling for three years before he joined the University of Richmond School of Law faculty in 2004. From 2009 to 2014, he was a special assistant U.S. attorney for the Western District of Virginia.

U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. appointed Spencer to two three-year terms on the U.S. Courts Advisory Committee on Civil Rules, beginning in 2017. Spencer serves in the Army Reserve as a government appellate attorney in the Army’s Judge Advocate General’s Corps.

In 2016, Spencer co-authored several volumes of the “Federal Practice and Procedure” reference book series, and he continues updating volumes of the treatise.