Stephen Smith joined the Birmingham Law School as a Lecturer in 2003 and teaches Bioethics and Jurisprudence on the LLB and Criminal Law and Medicine on the LLM. Prior to that, he completed his PhD at the University of Manchester on the impact of autonomy and paternalism on physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia in 2003. He also completed a Juris Doctorate degree at Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. which he received in 1998. He specialises in medico-ethical issues at the end of life. He has given papers at international conferences in Sydney, Manchester and Birmingham. His publications include the following:

• ‘Evidence for the Practical Slippery Slope in the Debate on Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia’, (2005) 13 Medical Law Review 17-44
• ‘Fallacies of the Logical Slippery Slope in the Debate on Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia’, (2005) 13 Medical Law Review 224-243
• ‘The Killing of Severely Disabled Newborns: The Spectre Behind the Legalisation of Physician-Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia?’, (2005) 24 Medicine and Law 791-802
• ‘Some Realism about End of Life: the Current Prohibition and the Euthanasia Underground’ [2007] 33 American Journal of Law and Medicine  55-95
• “Dignity: The Difference between Abortion and Neonaticide for the Severely Disabled” in The Criminal Justice System and Health Care, S. Ost and C. Erin (eds.) (Forthcoming)

Dr Smith is also currently the Deputy Director of the Institute of Medical Law.