Tony Ghiotto

Tony Ghiotto is the inaugural director of the Kimball R. and Karen Gatsis Anderson Center for Advocacy and Professionalism, as well as the director of Trial Advocacy and a teaching assistant professor of law. The Anderson Center offers training and generates scholarship in a wide variety of advocacy components, including trial advocacy, appellate advocacy, negotiations, and alternative dispute resolution, all while providing College of Law students with innovative classes and programs relating to the professional responsibility obligations attendant to client advocacy. Beyond directing the Anderson Center, Professor Ghiotto teaches courses in foundational and advanced trial advocacy. He also directs the College of Law’s award-winning trial and moot court teams. His scholarship focuses on advocacy in the criminal procedure and national security law contexts, with his works appearing in the Harvard National Security Journal, the Buffalo Law Review, the University of Baltimore Law Review, and the North Dakota Law Review.

Prior to joining the Illinois faculty, Professor Ghiotto spent five years as an assistant professor of law at Campbell University School of Law, where he taught criminal procedure, criminal law, national security law, and trial advocacy. The Campbell Law student body selected him as “Professor of the Year” in academic years 2019–2020 and 2020–2021. Professor Ghiotto joined academia after spending nearly 12 years as a judge advocate with the US Air Force. While serving as an active duty judge advocate, he prosecuted a wide range of felonies, served as a Staff Judge Advocate, was an Air Staff legal advisor to the Air Force’s Judge Advocate General, and performed special duties at the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Defense Legal Policy Board, in its investigation and report to the Secretary of Defense regarding the military services responses to civilian casualties caused by American service members in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also deployed to Parwan Province, Afghanistan, in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, where he represented the United States in over 100 Detainee Review Board hearings. He continues to serve in the rank of lieutenant colonel with the US Air Force Reserves. He is a proud product of Chicago’s south suburbs. He received his Bachelor of Arts in History and Political Science from the University of Illinois, his Master of Military Operational Art and Science from the Air Force’s prestigious Air Command and Staff College, and his Juris Doctor from Emory University School of Law.