Brian Shannon is a Paul Whitfield Horn Distinguished Professor at Texas Tech University, where he has been a member of the law faculty since 1988. In addition to his teaching duties, since 2008 Shannon has served as the University’s Faculty Athletics Representative (FAR) to the NCAA and the Big 12 Conference. In that role, Shannon is the Big 12 representative on the national board for the 1A FAR association, and he previously served three terms as President of 1A FAR. Shannon also served from 2015-19 on the NCAA Division I Council and chaired the Division I Legislative Committee.
Shannon earned his law degree in 1982 from the University of Texas School of Law, where he graduated first in his class, and he received a B.S. in Mathematics, summa cum laude, from Angelo State University in 1979. He formerly served as an attorney-advisor in the Office of the General Counsel to the Secretary of the Air Force at the Pentagon, and practiced law in Austin, Texas. During his years at Texas Tech he has taught a wide array of courses including Contracts, Criminal Law, Property, ADR, Products Liability, Mental Health Law, and others. He also served as the Law School’s associate dean for academic affairs for six years.
Shannon is an appointed member of the Texas Judicial Commission on Mental Health and a board member for StarCare Specialty Health Systems (the local mental health authority). Shannon is an elected member of the American Law Institute, a past president of the Lubbock Area Bar Association, and was appointed to four terms on the Texas Governor’s Committee on People with Disabilities. He is also a past chair of the State Bar of Texas Disability Issues Committee and served as an appointee of the Lt. Governor on the Task Force that re-wrote the state’s criminal competency statutes. He is the author of several books and numerous articles, and he won the Texas Bar Foundation’s Outstanding Law Journal Award in 2002, 2008, and 2014. He has also filed briefs in federal courts, the Texas Supreme Court, and the United States Supreme Court.