His work focuses on property law, particularly the legal doctrines that have caused Black Americans to lose millions of acres of land since the early 1900s.

Recently, he founded and became Director of the Initiative on Land, Housing & Property Rights alongside his wife, Professor Lisa T. Alexander, at Boston College Law School.

[4] Mitchell has studied the legal processes by which this loss occurred, particularly that laws that govern inheritance in cases where an owner does not leave a will and there are multiple heirs.

These doctrines have, over time, caused large amounts of land to leave the heirs of Black property owners through mechanisms like forced partition sales.

[8] As a part of his current employment at the Boston College Law School (2022), he has designated time to further research into Heirs Property and the issues surrounding those that are effected.