Rate My Professor Geoff Hall

Professor Geoff Hall is an Emeritus Professor of Law in the Faculty of Law at the University of Otago. He earned his LLB (Hons) from the University of Otago and LLM from Victoria University of Wellington. Hall has been a lecturer in the Faculty of Law since 1975, progressing to Senior Lecturer and later appointed Professor of Law in 2006. Before his extensive academic career, he practised law briefly in New South Wales during the late 1980s and directed the Fiji Law Reform Commission in 1992, overseeing its re-establishment. In December 2014, he was conferred the title of Emeritus Professor of Law and has continued to lecture part-time. Hall served as technical adviser to the Department of Courts' Sentencing Information System and oversees the Sentencing Digest publication for the Ministry of Justice.

His research specializations encompass criminal law, criminology, sentencing, sentencing information systems, transport law, and public law. Hall is renowned for his authoritative contributions to sentencing law through key publications, including Hall's Sentencing (Vols. 1-3, 2011 and 2012 editions), Becroft and Hall's Transport Law (Vols. 1-2, Land transport and related legislation; Bill of rights sentencing, 2011 and 2012), Sentencing Law and Practice (3rd edition), and the Penalty Guide for Judicial Committees (2011), commissioned by the Board of Judicial Control Authority. These works serve as essential references for practitioners and judiciary in New Zealand. In 2008, he delivered his Inaugural Professorial Lecture titled 'Bloody Idiots! Have the drunks behind the wheel finally met their match?', addressing transport law and sentencing issues related to drink-driving. Hall's advisory roles and publications have had a substantial impact on sentencing practices and legal reform in New Zealand.