Prof. Carl M. Warren graduated from the University of Minnesota law school in 1975, after which he served for 15 years as a trial attorney for the Minnesota Attorney General's Office, primarily in the area of Human Rights enforcement. From 1990 to 2016, he was a member of the clinical faculty at the University of Minnesota Law School where he taught in its Civil Practice Clinic. While there, from 1992 to 2014 he was faculty advisor to the law school's Civil Rights Moot Court and, in that capacity, oversaw the McGee National Civil Rights Moot Court Competition and its related continuing legal and judicial education programs.

In 2016, Professor Warren joined the clinical faculty at the University of St. Thomas School of Law where he directs its Community Justice Project, a policy-based clinic in which student attorney practitioners investigate social justice issues that are adversely affecting the community, and develop, and seek to implement policy-making solutions usually in collaboration with community-based partners. Professor Warren has taught and been a frequent speaker on issues concerning race, civil rights, and the impact of bias on perception, judgment, the administration of justice, and the practice of law.