i have the opportunity to clerk for a senior district judge - but he only does civil cases. i'd like to be a criminal defense attorney. will this still be a good experience for me, worth the time? not sure any other clerkship opportunities will come my way. do you think other judges in the district will let me work on one or two criminal cases or is that frowned upon?

Waste of time

can you be a little more specific? why do you think that? what does a clerk do for civil versus criminal? thank you!

would you play baseball if your goal was to become a soccer player?

These replies are wonderful uses of the anonymous function to give unsupported and unconvincing advice.

Clerkships are helpful for your career, regardless of what you learn in them.

A few things:

Keep in mind that the civil docket might include habeas (habeas is "officially" civil in nature) and immigration. Look into that--that could give you some exposure to "criminal-type" stuff.

The civil docket also includes Sec. 1983 cases. Many of those cases allege that person x was arrested without probable cause or that a search was improperly conducted. Those issues will be relevant to criminal work.

At the end of the day, litigation is litigation. There are significant differences between criminal and civil litigation, but there is a lot of crossover, too. That's why big firm litigators often do criminal stuff pro bono: it's seen as a training opportunity.

Don't listen to these dumb fucks. Yes, it's useful. Go for it.

Yes, go for it. ALthough its civil, in the end you are training to interpret court rules and conduct legal research in areas you are unfamiliar with. Those skills easily translate into the criminal arena - you'll just be researching criminal rules and statutes instead, but the foundation is the same for both.

Definitely take the job - it will be a huge value add no matter what you end up doing afterward. Criminal law is the worst, though, imo; completely incoherent and un-fun to work within. Maybe a year working on interesting civil cases will likewise convince you.

Thanks for your thoughts! I guess I will take the job and not be disappointed that I am not interacting with AUSAs every day.