About Dr. Patrick

Wendy L. Patrick is a career prosecutor, presented by the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court with the California Public Lawyer of the Year award from the State Bar’s Public Law Section, named as one of the 2024 Top Professional Responsibility Lawyers by the State Bar of California, and honored with the 2023 Instructor of the Year Award by the California District Attorneys Association.  Dr. Patrick has completed over 165 trials ranging from hate crimes to domestic violence to first-degree murder.  Before becoming a prosecutor, she was a trial attorney and team leader in the San Diego Public Defender’s office.

Dr. Patrick owns Black Swan Verdicts, a full service publicity and consulting business. She speaks, publishes, consults, and trains worldwide.

Areas of Expertise

· Threat Assessment: How to Distinguish Danger from Drama

· The Dark and Bright Side of Artificial Intelligence

· Spotting a Sexual Harasser/ Predator in the Making

· Stalking/ Cyberstalking/ Human Trafficking

· Domestic Violence/ Child Abduction/ Abuse

· How to Detect and Discourage Quiet Quitting

· Cultural Competence/ Diversity/ Elimination of Bias

· Negotiation/ Trial Skills

· Reading People and Judging Credibility

· Leadership: Managing Challenging People/ Workplace Culture/ Social Climate Change 

· Substance Abuse/ Competence/ Mental Health Issues in the Workplace

· Ethics and Professionalism

Training and Experience

As a career prosecutor, Dr. Patrick handled a steady stream of threat assessment cases. She has years of experience specifically tasked with investigating and prosecuting threats against politicians, judges, and other public officials, as well as other types of licensed professionals. She is a past president of the Association of Threat Assessment Professionals (ATAP) San Diego Chapter, former Sergeant of Arms of the ATAP national board, and an ATAP Certified Threat Manager. 

Dr. Patrick teaches workplace violence, threat assessment, and how to read red flags—both on and offline, for a variety of companies, community groups, as well as legal and educational institutions. She is also an Institute of Criminal Investigation certified instructor for law enforcement.

On the topics of sexual assault and human trafficking, Dr. Patrick lectures nationally and internationally, presenting everywhere from Hong Kong, to South Korea, to South Africa. She teaches sexual assault prevention for several branches of the United States military, having presented for the Army domestically as well as in Bavaria and Wiesbaden, Germany. 

Within the business and legal community, Dr. Patrick has been teaching ethics and professionalism, trial skills, substance abuse, cultural and professional competence, elimination of bias, and other subjects around the country on a regular basis for over twenty years. 

Motivationally, Dr. Patrick presents seminars, keynote speeches, and workshops on topics related to reading people, persuasion, and impression management. 

Awards and Recognitions 

In addition to being selected by her peers as one of the Top Ten criminal attorneys in San Diego and named the Ronald M. George Public Lawyer of the Year, Dr. Patrick received an Outstanding Achievement Award from the San Diego Deputy District Attorneys Association, recognized by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors by declaring October 8, 2013 to be “Wendy Patrick Day” throughout San Diego County. 

Dr. Patrick received the Sexual Assault Response Team Response With a Heart Award, the Service to the San Diego County Bar Association award, the Friend of the Community Award from the Tom Homann Law Association for her work prosecuting hate crimes, and was recognized early in her career as one of San Diego Metropolitan Magazine’s 40 under 40 honorees. 

Educational Background

Dr. Patrick received a Ph.D. in Theology from the University of Wales Trinity Saint David and a Master of Divinity degree summa cum laude from Bethel Seminary San Diego where she was awarded the Excellence in Preaching Award and the Zondervan Biblical Languages Award. She is ordained as a Christian minister through Converge Worldwide.  She received her law degree from California Western School of Law, and her bachelor’s degree in psychology with honors from the University of California Los Angeles. 

Her legal education was multi-cultural and included study in Vienna, Austria, Budapest, Hungary, and with a Barrister firm in London, England. Dr. Patrick is admitted to practice law in California, the United States District Court in the Southern District of California, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court.

Books and Publications 

 Ms. Patrick is published on a regular basis. She is author of Why Bad Looks Good: Biblical Wisdom to Make Smart Choices (BroadStreet Publishers), Red Flags: How to Spot Frenemies, Underminers, and Ruthless People (St. Martin´s Press), and co-author of the revised version of the New York Times bestseller Reading People (Random House). She is also author of Using the Psychology of Attraction in Christian Outreach: Lessons from the Dark Side (Peter Lang).   

Dr. Patrick was a contributing author to the Encyclopedia of Race and Racism (Macmillan Reference) and Hate Crimes: Causes, Controls, and Controversies (SAGE). She is published frequently in the Los Angeles Daily Journal, has authored several articles for The Practical Litigator (ALI ABA national publication), and wrote a monthly ethics MCLE article for the California Bar Journal for years.  Dr. Patrick is also a writer and past editorial Board member for the national American Inns of Court publication The Bencher. 

Dr. Patrick has her own column in Psychology Today  with over 770 articles published, had a regular column in Law Enforcement Quarterly, has been a Huffington Post contributor, and had her own ethics column in the San Diego Daily Transcript for over a decade. She has been quoted in a variety of sources such as The New York Times, USA Today, US News and World Report, Washington Post, Associated Press, Bloomberg Businessweek, CSNBC, CNN.com, FoxNews.com, The Oprah Magazine, Cosmopolitan, and The Christian Science Monitor.

Media Experience

Dr. Patrick is on the air daily, including weekly on Fox News Channel, Nancy Grace, and court TV, discussing many of the same subjects she consults on, with over 8,500 media appearances with major news outlets including CNN, Fox News Channel, HLN, and FOX Business Network. She has her own radio show on KCBQ called Today With Dr. Wendy, a biweekly radio tour on Fox News Radio called Weekly Legal, a weekly slot on Fox 5 San Diego called Inside the Law, had her own segment for years as a behavioral analyst on Australia´s Seven Network Morning Show called Spotted.  Dr. Patrick has guest anchored national media, and served as a regular guest host for KOGO radio San Diego as well as other stations.

Academic Teaching Experience

Dr. Patrick has been a faculty member at San Diego State University for over a decade, where she has taught, among other courses, upper division business ethics in the Management Department of the College of Business Administration, both on campus and abroad—including teaching in Barcelona, Spain, and Prague, Czech Republic. 

She is a course designer and Lead Instructor for the Law Enforcement & Public Safety Leadership Program at the University of San Diego Master of Science Program where she teaches Communication for Law Enforcement Leaders, Conflict Resolution, and Organizational Theory and Change. 

Dr. Patrick is also a Professor of Theology, Law, and Culture for Veritas International University, a course designer and criminal law instructor at Trinity International University Law School, and regularly guest lectures at other educational institutions. 

Professional Associations

Dr. Patrick is co-chair of the California District Attorneys Association Ethics Committee and High-Tech Committee, a past Chair and Advisor of the California State Bar Ethics Committee (Committee on Professional Responsibility and Conduct), and past Chair of the San Diego County Bar Association’s (SDCBA) Legal Ethics Committee where she served a six-year term. She is widely published in the field of legal ethics, had her own ethics column in the San Diego Daily Transcript for more than a decade, and teaches ethics nationally on a regular basis. 

Within the threat assessment community, Dr. Patrick is a former Sergeant of Arms of the ATAP national board, and past ATAP Pacific Southwest chapter president. In the faith based community, she is past president of the Christian Legal Society Metro New York chapter, and a member of the San Diego District Attorney Inter-Faith Advisory Board.  Within the legal community she is a Master, Team Leader, Executive Board member, and Programs Chair for the Louis M. Welsh American Inn of Court, and an elected member of the American Law Institute.

On a personal note, Dr. Patrick holds a purple belt in Shorin-Ryu karate, is a concert violinist with the La Jolla Symphony, and plays the electric violin professionally with a rock band, performing both locally and in Hollywood. 

Dr. Patrick has been quoted in numerous publications including:· The New York Times· Forbes· Readers’ Digest· USA Today· Washington Post· Wall Street Journal· CNN.com· Reuters.com· US News and World Report· Associated Press· The Christian Science Monitor· Investors’ Business Daily News· The Washington Times· Bloomberg Business· Foxbusiness.com · FOX News Magazine· Concealed Carry Magazine· MarketWatch· Los Angeles Times · CNBC.com· Deseret News National· San Diego Union Tribune · The San Francisco Chronicle· OKmagazine.com· Greenbiz.com· Law 360· National Law Journal · ABA Journal · Cosmopolitan.com· The Oprah Magazine