Harvard Law School Association of Northern California

The Supreme Court’s Decision in 
City of Grants Pass v. Johnson and the Legal Limits 
on Responses to the Homelessness Crisis

Thursday, July 18, 2024

6:00 – 8:00 PM

Drinks and hors d’ouevres reception starts at 6:00 pm; 
panel discussion starts at 6:45 pm

Gibson Dunn
One Embarcadero Center, # 2600
San Francisco, CA 94111

This panel will discuss recent litigation over whether enforcement of laws prohibiting sleeping and camping in public are unconstitutional as applied to unsheltered individuals.  The discussion will focus on the Supreme Court’s decision in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, which concerns whether the enforcement of generally applicable 
laws regulating camping on public property constitutes “cruel and unusual punishment” prohibited by the Eighth Amendment, as well as the Coalition on Homelessness v. 
City of San Francisco litigation challenging San Francisco’s enforcement
of ordinances against unsheltered individuals.

About Shilpi Agarwal

Shilpi Agarwal is the legal director at the ACLU of Northern California. In that role, she provides strategic guidance that shapes the organization’s policy portfolio and its litigation docket. She also oversees every affirmative case brought by the organization and provides direct support to litigation teams.  Prior to joining the ACLU, Shilpi was an assistant federal public defender in San Francisco, where she regularly briefed and argued issues to uphold the rights of indigent people accused of federal crimes. In that role, Shilpi served as lead counsel in multiple federal trials and argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Prior to that, Shilpi was an associate at Keker & Van Nest (now Keker, Van Nest & Peters), where she worked on complex civil litigation, criminal defense matters, and trials.

Shilpi received a bachelor’s degree in both political science and economics from Stanford University, and a J.D. from Columbia Law School, where she spent a semester working with the Legal Director of ACLU’s national office. After law school, Shilpi clerked for Judge Keith P. Ellison in the Southern District of Texas and then for Judge Betty B. Fletcher in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

About Bradley Hamburger

Bradley J. Hamburger is a litigation partner in the Los Angeles office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. His practice focuses on class actions and complex litigation in both trial courts and on appeal. He is a member of the firm’s Class Actions, Appellate and Constitutional Law, and Labor and Employment practice groups.  Brad has represented clients in class actions and appeals across many areas of law, including employment, insurance, antitrust, consumer fraud, products liability, legal malpractice, and administrative law. He has briefed dozens of appeals, including cases in the United States Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit, and the California Supreme Court, and has argued before the Ninth Circuit and the California Court of Appeal.

Brad graduated from Harvard Law School in 2009. While at Harvard he served as co-Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Technology and was a member of the Board of Student Advisers. He graduated with honors from the University of California, Berkeley in 2004.  Brad served as a law clerk to the Honorable James V. Selna in the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

Brad is part of the team that represented the City of Grants Pass before the U.S. Supreme Court in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson.

RSVP required by July 14, 2024