Professor Jancy Hoeffel Honored as a Champion of Justice

Law Communications lawcommunications@tulane.edu

Professor Janet “Jancy” Hoeffel was honored at the Innocence & Justice Louisiana 25th anniversary gala recently in recognition of more than two decades of service to the organization.

Formerly known as the Innocence Project New Orleans, the organization changed its name to Innocence & Justice Louisiana, or IJLA, in 2025 to better reflect its statewide mission and work across Louisiana’s 64 parishes.

For more than 20 years, Hoeffel has served on the organization’s Case Review Panel, providing legal expertise and guidance in evaluating post-conviction innocence cases. The work requires careful legal analysis, ethical judgment and considerable expertise as the panel helps identify cases with the greatest potential for success. Hoeffel also served on one of the organization’s early boards and has served as an expert witness.

Hoeffel received the Impact Award alongside two fellow longtime Case Review Panel members: Tulane Law alumnus Rick Schroeder (L’88), a retired senior partner at Jones Walker, and prominent criminal defense attorney Jim Boren.

Schroeder spent his career litigating criminal and civil matters and is a former president of the Louisiana Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. In 2025, he received the organization’s most prestigious lifetime achievement honor, the Justice Albert Tate Jr. Award. A longtime supporter of innocence work in Louisiana, Schroeder also served on the board of the Innocence Project New Orleans, including a term as chair.

IJLA is a Louisiana nonprofit dedicated to freeing people serving life sentences or other unjust sentences. During its 25-year history, the organization has successfully freed or exonerated every post-conviction innocence client it has represented.

The organization also has a long relationship with Tulane Law, providing students with externship opportunities and opportunities to fulfill the pro bono requirement for graduation while gaining experience working on post-conviction cases.

“Professor Hoeffel has devoted her career to the idea that lawyers have both the ability and the responsibility to make our justice system better. Her extraordinary service to Innocence & Justice Louisiana reflects the same integrity, compassion and commitment she has brought to her students and to Tulane Law for more than 25 years,” said law Dean Marcilynn Burke. “We are tremendously proud of the impact she continues to have on our profession and our community.”

Tulane Law Dean, Faculty, Honor Professor Hoeffel at IJLA Event
Professor Hoeffel with Dean Marcilynn Burke and Tulane Law colleagues. 

Hoeffel, the Catherine D. Pierson Professor of Law at Tulane, is widely regarded for her commitment to public interest law. In addition to her work with IJLA, she has served on the boards of the Louisiana Public Defender Board, Promise of Justice Initiative and Capital Appeals Project. Before joining Tulane, she worked as a public defender in Washington, D.C.

Since joining Tulane Law in 1999, Hoeffel has held a variety of roles, from vice dean and Moot Court faculty adviser to enthusiastic auctioneer at the annual Public Interest Law Foundation auction, where she has been a steadfast supporter of students pursuing public interest work.

But it is in the classroom where Hoeffel has perhaps had her broadest impact. A dedicated teacher and mentor, she has encouraged generations of Tulane Law students to see public interest work as an essential part of the profession — and, for some, as a calling.

Among her former students are Emily Bolton (L’00), who went on to found the Innocence Project New Orleans, and Emily Maw (L’03), who later led the organization from 2005 to 2018. Their work is part of a much larger legacy of Hoeffel’s teaching: graduates who have carried lessons from her classroom into careers devoted to public defense, innocence work and advocacy for people caught up in the criminal legal system.

That influence has been recognized repeatedly by her students and the university. Students twice selected Hoeffel for the Felix Frankfurter Award for Distinguished Teaching, and in 2017 she received the Tulane University President’s Award for Excellence in Professional and Graduate Teaching, the university’s highest teaching honor.