Nora Freeman Engstrom’s scholarship lies at the intersection of tort law and professional ethics. Her current work explores the day-to-day operation of the tort system and particularly the tort system’s interaction with alternative compensation mechanisms, such as workers’ compensation and no-fault automobile insurance. Professor Engstrom has also written extensively on law firms she calls “settlement mills”—high-volume personal injury law practices that heavily advertise and mass-produce the resolution of claims.

Before joining Stanford Law’s faculty in 2009, Professor Engstrom, JD ’02, was a research dean’s scholar at Georgetown University Law Center and an associate at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, where she drafted several U.S. Supreme Court briefs and represented clients before various appellate and trial courts. She was also a law clerk to Judge Merrick B. Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr., of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Prior to law school, she worked at the U.S. Department of Justice, focusing on domestic terrorism and national security issues.