William Kunstler (born July 7, 1919, New York, New York, U.S.—died September 4, 1995, New York, New York) was an American lawyer who was a flamboyant left-wing attorney known for defending a number of controversial clients in high-profile cases. He gained national renown during the trial of the "Chicago Seven" on charges of having conspired to incite riots in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The disruptive antics of the defendants and Kunstler’s spirited battles with the judge led to hundreds of contempt citations. Kunstler himself was sentenced to 4 years and 13 days, but most of the counts were dismissed on appeal, and he was not imprisoned.
After graduating (1941) from Yale University, Kunstler saw World War II army service in the Pacific and was awarded a Bronze Star. He then attended Columbia University School of Law, New York City, graduating in 1948. His law practice was unremarkable until, in the mid-1950s, he represented a State Department employee whose travel to China as a freelance writer had resulted in the confiscation of his passport. Kunstler became involved with the American Civil Liberties Union and with such clients as the antisegregationist Freedom Riders in the South and the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., not only defending them in court but becoming active in their respective causes.
Later cases that reflected Kunstler’s political leanings were those in which he represented Black power activists Stokely Carmichael and Bobby Seale, antiwar activist Daniel Berrigan, and prisoners accused in the aftermath of the deadly 1971 riot at the Attica (New York) state prison. Most controversial was his defense of such clients as alleged Mafia boss John Gotti and, in his last case, suspected terrorists linked to the bombing of New York City’s World Trade Center in 1993. Kunstler’s books include Beyond a Reasonable Doubt? (1961; editor) and The Case for Courage (1962).