Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics Perspectives Fall 2018

T H E GEORGE WA SHI NGTON U N I V ER SIT Y L AW SCHOOL

JACOB BURNS COMMUNITY LEGAL CLINICS

Perspectives

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SPOTLIGHT

FALL 2018 ISSUE

A Decade’s Legacy: GW Law’s Friedman Fellows

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nnie B. Smith is a tenured Associate Professor of Law at the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville. She directs the Civil Litigation and Advocacy Clinic and a Human Trafficking Clinic that she created.

Recently, the law school also appointed her the Director of Pro Bono and Community Engagement. She has taught interviewing, counseling, and negotiations as well.

Professor Smith’s academic career began in GW Law’s Friedman Clinical Fellowship program. Funded in major part by a generous donation from Philip Friedman, Esq. in 2006 and established by Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb in 2008,

Friedman Fellows, past and present, with Dean Goldfarb (far left)

the Friedman Fellowship was conceived for attorneys—especially those dedicated to public interest practice—who are contemplating a shift into clinical teaching. Dean Goldfarb designed the fellowship to help attorneys make that shift, supporting their development as clinical teachers and scholars while they support the teaching and service mission of the Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics. It’s a win-win arrangement in which the law school receives the benefits of the fellows’ talents and contributions while promoting their careers in academia and public interest law.

For the past 10 years, Friedman Fellows have enhanced the work of the Clinics while taking other courses and earning an LLM degree. Fellows co-teach and co-supervise in a particular clinic along with experienced clinical faculty, learning from the faculty member’s supervision and example. Among the LLM courses for the Friedman Fellows is Clinical Teaching and Scholarship, a two-year class created and taught by Dean Goldfarb to cultivate clinical methods of teaching and supervision and academic methods of research and scholarship. Dean Goldfarb supervises the fellows in writing their graduate theses, most of which have been published thereafter.

Prior to the Friedman Fellowship, Professor Smith’s career as a civil legal attorney was focused on migrant workers’ rights. While at the Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics, Professor Smith assisted in teaching and supervising the classwork and casework in both the continued on page 18

SPOTLIGHT 1, 18–19 SELECTED PRESENTATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS 2–3 NEWS 4 KUDOS 5–6 INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES 7–15 EVENTS 16–17

SPOTLIGHT

Clinic Students Solve Decades-Old Mystery and Reunite Family

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nvolvement in clinical legal education often leads to important outcomes for clients and valuable lessons for students. Sometimes, it also leads to poignant stories.

One of the most meaningful stories of the past year came from the Public Justice Advocacy Clinic (PJAC), taught and directed by Professor Jeffrey Gutman. When third-year student-attorneys Noelle Cozbar and Soo Choi met Mr. P. early in the continued on page 19

Professor Jeffrey Gutman with (l–r) students Noelle Coxbar and David Coard, client Mr. P., and student Caroline Merlin.

SELECTED PRESENTATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS

Selected Presentations and Publications In November 2017, Professor Arturo Carrillo was a panelist on the topic of “The Challenges of Pre-Crime Prevention Measures” at a conference titled Challenges to Preventing Extremism Online and Offline. The program was co-sponsored by the law school’s Global Internet Freedom Project, co-directed by Professor Carrillo and Professor Dawn Nunziato. In December, the project also co-hosted, with GW’s Program on Extremism and the U.S. Department of State, a roundtable discussion with the Undersecretary General of the United Nations Office of Counterterrorism.

Professor Arturo Carrillo

Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb published “Exploring the Meaning of Experiential Deaning” with four co-authors in the spring 2018 issue of the Journal of Legal Education. She also published “Arriving Where We’ve Been: Death’s Indignity and the Eighth Amendment,” 103 Iowa Law Review Online 386 (2018), and “Equality Writ Large,” 17 Nevada Law Journal 565 (2017).

In the 2017-18 academic year, Dean Goldfarb gave a number of presentations on clinical legal education. In May 2018, at the annual Conference on Clinical Legal Education of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS), she presented on a panel called “Inside Out: Clinic Models in Practices Outside the Law School.” In December 2017, she was a panelist on a program

titled Thinking Structurally About Justice Education and Experiential Legal Programs at the ninth Worldwide Conference of the Global Alliance for Justice Education (GAJE), held at the Instituto Technologico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey in Puebla, Mexico. In October 2017, she spoke at the Midwest Clinical Conference, held at the University of Kansas Law School, on a panel about the opportunities and challenges in expanding clinical pedagogy. In July 2017, she gave a presentation in the Innovative Curriculum section of the 2017 Conference of the International Journal of Clinical Legal Education at the University of Northumbria, Newcastle-on-Tyne, England.

In December 2017, Dean Goldfarb spoke on the development of clinical education to lawyers and law professors from Tajikistan who were participating in a Legal Education Study Tour with the Rule of Law Initiative of the American Bar Association (ABA). In September 2017 at a conference at New England Law School, she presented “The Importance of Theory in the Law School Classroom and in the Practice of Law.” Also in September, Dean Goldfarb and Professor Susan Jones spoke on legal education reform and clinical programs in U.S. law schools to Argentinian law school deans participating in the International Visitor Leadership Program of the U.S. Department of State.

Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb

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In March 2018, Professor Jeffrey Gutman presented a paper on compensation for wrongful convictions at the Innocence Network’s conference in Memphis. As part of a collaboration with the GW Department of Statistics, he will publish a longer version of the paper in the Northeastern Law Review (forthcoming 2019).

Professor Susan Jones

Professor Susan Jones has signed a book contract with the ABA to co-edit with Dorcas Gilmore and Lisa Greene Hall the book Investing for Social and Economic Impact: A Guide for Lawyers and Practitioners, slated for publication in 2019. She published “Is Social Innovation Financing through Social Impact Bonds the Last Hope for Community Economic Development Programs during the Trump Administration?,” 26 ABA Journal of Affordable Housing and Community Development Law 351 (2017).

In June 2018, Professor Jones gave two presentations at Legal Issues in Social Entrepreneurship and Impact Investing in the U.S. and Beyond, a conference sponsored by the Grunin Center for Law and Social Entrepreneurship at New York University (NYU) Law School. The first presentation was “Community Driven Investment Strategies” and the second was “Reimagining Legal Education from Mapping to Action.” Professor Jones also served as a scholarship commentator at the conference. From June 2017 to March 2018, she co-chaired the Grunin Center’s

SELECTED PRESENTATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS

Academic Group on Reimagining Legal Education.

In April 2018, Professor Jones was a panelist at the Transactional Clinic Conference in Chicago, presenting on the topic of representing social entrepreneurs and impact investors in transactional clinics. Also in April, she presented “Reimagining Legal Education to Prepare Law Students to Serve Social Innovators” at the Ashoka Exchange in Boston, a meeting of the world’s leaders in social innovation in higher education. In December, she spoke on the panel Innovations in Justice Education: Entrepreneurship for the Formerly Incarcerated at the ninth Worldwide GAJE conference in Puebla, Mexico.

In June 2018, Professor Laurie Kohn presented “Just Like You and Me? Domestic Violence in the Lives of the Rich and Famous” at the Law and Society Association’s Annual Meeting in Toronto, Canada. In May, she was a panelist for a concurrent session on teaching and supervising millennials at the 2018 AALS Conference on Clinical Legal Education in Chicago. In September 2017, at the Clinical Law Review’s Clinical Writer’s Workshop held at NYU Law School, Professor Kohn presented her book project “Who Cares about Rihanna?

Domestic Violence in the Lives of the Rich and the Not-so-Rich.”

Professor Joan Meier published (with Sean Dickson) “Dangerous Liaisons: A Domestic Violence Typology in Custody Litigation” in 70 Rutgers University Law Review 115 (2017).

In a variety of settings, Professor Meier has been presenting findings from her federally funded empirical research on family court practices. The research is confirming courts’ widespread disbelief of mothers’ claims of abuse, resulting in mothers regularly losing custody to fathers they claim are abusive. Professor Meier presented some of these preliminary research results at the International Society of Family Law’s North American Regional Conference, held at the

New York University Law Review (forthcoming 2018). In February 2018, she presented her article as a work-in-progress to the faculty at Temple University Beasley School of Law. She also published the 2018 Parole Manual for the District of Columbia, with co-author Visiting Associate Professor Katy Ramsey (see story on p. 4).

Professor Joan Meier

University of Minnesota Law School in April 2018, and at the Battered Mothers’ Custody Conference in upstate New York in May 2018. She also conducted a webinar for the Battered Women’s Justice Project on a related pilot study, focusing on evidence of gender bias in custody cases involving claims of abuse and parental alienation. In June 2018, she organized a panel of international researchers on parental alienation and abuse claims in custody litigation and presented “What is Really Happening in Family Courts? A National Empirical Study of Courts’ Responses to Domestic Violence, Child Abuse, and Parental Alienation Claims” at the annual meeting of the Law and Society Association in Toronto, Canada.

In April 2018, Professor Meier trained the fellows of Georgetown University Law Center’s Affordable Law Firm on custody and abuse issues and making a record for appeal. In March 2018, Professor Meier spoke to a group of professionals in the International Visitor Leadership Program of the U.S. Department of State about legal developments to stop domestic violence in the United States. She also conducted a session for the Women’s Law and Public Policy Fellows at Georgetown University Law Center on managing vicarious trauma.

Professor Jessica Steinberg’s article “A Theory of Civil Problem-Solving Courts” has been accepted for publication in the

Visiting Associate Professor Katy Ramsey has had her LLM thesis “One Strike 2.0: How Local Governments are Distorting a Flawed Federal Eviction Law,” written during her Friedman Fellowship, accepted for publication in 65 UCLA Law Review 1146 (2018).

In May 2018, Professor Ramsey was a speaker on the panel “Teaching Implicit Bias as a Lawyering Skill,” presented at the 2018 AALS Conference on Clinical Legal Education in Chicago.

In September 2017, she presented her paper “CrimEviction: The Detrimental Consequences of the Civil-Criminal Divide for Tenants at Risk of Eviction for Criminal Activity” at the Clinical Writer’s Workshop at NYU Law School.

In June 2018, Visiting Professor Erin Scheick presented her paper “Reimagining Accountability in Domestic Violence Cases: A Public Health-Inspired Approach to Intervention and Prevention” at the Law and Society Association’s Annual Meeting in Toronto, Canada. She also presented the paper in September at the Clinical Writer’s Workshop at NYU Law School.

In May 2018, Karimah Dosunmu, JD ’18, Student Director of the Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics, who participated in the Domestic Violence Project and the Family Justice Litigation Clinic, gave a presentation on domestic violence at GW’s Service-Learning Symposium. n

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NEWS

NEWS Clinic Releases New Parole Manual

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he District of Columbia had never had an instruction manual for incarcerated inmates who were seeking parole or for the legal advocates assisting them. Now it does. Based on their work at GW, Professor Jessica Steinberg and Visiting Professor Katy Ramsey became co-authors of a comprehensive primer, the 2018 Parole Practice Manual for the District of Columbia. On June 2018, their clinic held a release party for the new manual.

A few years ago, Professor Steinberg and then-Friedman Fellow Ramsey, who were co-teaching and co-supervising in GW’s Prisoner and Reentry Clinic, responded to the urging of community advocates that they draft such a primer. The advocates saw the primer as facilitating much-needed pro bono

representation and self-representation for incarcerated District residents who were eligible for parole. Since students in the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic handle a number of D.C. parole cases each semester, Professors Steinberg and Ramsey—the students’ supervisors—were well-positioned to respond to the need for an instructional guide.

As summer 2018 began, the law school hosted a launch party for the new parole manual, inviting the community advocates who had suggested and supported its creation to pick up a hard copy of the manual and celebrate its publication.

Director of Strategic Marketing and Communications Elizabeth Field and the GW Law Communications Office were instrumental in the assembly, design, and printing of the manual. The manual is available for download free of charge on the clinic’s website at www.law.gwu.edu/ prisoner-reentry-clinic.

Former students in the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic turned out for the launch party, as did two former clinic clients, both of whom had been released from incarceration following their representation by students and faculty in the

Professor Jessica Steinberg (l–r) with former clients Rudolph Norris and Charles Binion, along with Professr Katy Ramsey, celebrate the release of the Parole Practice Manual.

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Prisoner and Reentry Clinic. One of the clinic’s clients, Charles Binion, had been released on parole after 23 years following his parole hearing conducted by students in the clinic.

The other client who spoke at the reception, Rudolph Norris, had been released from extended incarceration after the clinic filed a clemency petition on his behalf with then-President Obama. In a front-page story on August 14, 2015, The New York Times covered the clinic’s work and Mr. Norris’ release.

On September 1, 2015, the Times also published Professor Steinberg’s letter to the editor on the clemency cases handled by clinical programs. Mr. Norris’ case, along with the clinic’s victorious presidential clemency case for client Fred Glover, was the cover story of the GW Law Magazine in summer 2017.

At the launch party, both Mr. Binion and Mr. Norris spoke of the importance of the high-quality representation in post-conviction proceedings provided by the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic. They expressed delight in the publication of a manual that would help other deserving inmates obtain the competent representation that they had received from faculty and students in the clinic.

Professors Steinberg and Ramsey also spoke at the event. They described the parole representation work of the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic, the evolution of the manual, and the support they received in bringing the manual into being. Each observed that the opportunity to represent clients in post-conviction proceedings is a genuine privilege and expressed hope that their manual would introduce many other pro bono attorneys to that privilege as well. n

KUDOS

Kudos Based on a 2017 survey, The Washington Post named Professor Alberto Benitez and the GW Immigration Clinic—along with GW alumni Ava Benach, Laura Foote Reiff, Jose Pertierra, and Nancy Lawrence—to its list of Best Lawyers in the immigration law field.

Professors Arturo Carrillo and Dawn Nunziato co-organized a panel on the Future of Net Neutrality held at GW in March 2018.

In fall 2017, Professor Carrillo testified before the Council of the District of Columbia’s Committee on Government Operations about the effect of the Federal Communication Commission’s repeal of net neutrality. In January 2018, he participated in a Public Oversight Roundtable on this topic.

Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb served as a member of the AALS Planning Committee that organized

the Annual Conference on Clinical Legal Education held April 29 through May 3, 2018 in Chicago, Illinois. Through her continuing work as Editor-in Chief of the Clinical Law Review, she co-organized the 2017 Clinical Law Review’s Writer’s Workshop, held at New York University Law School in September 2017. She also served as a small-group facilitator at the September workshop.

Dean Goldfarb and Professor Anne Olesen served as faculty advisors to GW Law’s Inns of Court, the law school’s professional development program for first-year law students. Dean Goldfarb was an advisor to the Cardozo Inn, and Professor Olesen was an advisor to the Jackson Inn. In April 2018, the Associated Press quoted Dean Goldfarb on the double jeopardy issues implicated by Alabama’s failed attempt to execute a condemned inmate by lethal injection and their subsequent effort to try to execute him again.

In March 2018, she was quoted in the Montgomery Advertiser on the same issue.

During the past year, Professor Jeffrey Gutman has spoken to the press on a number of occasions regarding his research on compensation for wrongful convictions. In June 2018, he was interviewed by documentary filmmakers who are producing a film about wrongful convictions in Pennsylvania. In May 2018, his research was described in a May 2 ProPublica article about the settlement of a wrongful conviction lawsuit in Baltimore. In October 2017, Professor Gutman was quoted on WBRC-Fox 6 about the findings of his research on how states compensate the wrongly convicted.

Also in October, he was quoted about his research findings on state compensation laws by the New England Center for Investigative Reporting. In November

Professor Jeffrey Gutman

2017, Professor Gutman was quoted in the Washington Lawyer on the impact of judicial vacancies on the administration of justice.

During 2017-18, Professor Suzanne Jackson continued to oversee and co-administer GW Law’s Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP), which provides forgivable loans to law school alumni in public interest law careers. LRAP enables alumni to meet their student loan payments while receiving public interest salaries.

Professor Suzanne Jackson Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb continued on page 6

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KUDOS

Kudos from page 5

abuse. Also in February, Professor Meier’s research on the adverse impact of mothers’ allegations of abuse on their custody cases was cited in a Pennsylvania newspaper, the Reading Eagle. On December 15, 2017, The Washington Post published Professor Meier’s letter to the editor challenging an article’s apparent acceptance of the false belief that fathers fare poorly in custody cases.

Professor Laurie Kohn

bill would reduce barriers for people with past criminal records to obtain occupational licenses.

Visiting Associate Professor Katy Ramsey has accepted a tenure-track clinical teaching position at the University of Memphis School of Law. In 2018-19, she will be directing the law school’s MedicalLegal Partnership Clinic. The partnership includes lawyers, doctors, law students, medical students, and social workers and is based at the only comprehensive children’s hospital in Memphis.

Visiting Associate Professor Erin Scheick has accepted a position as a Senior Supervising Attorney at Bread for the City in D.C. She will be supervising domestic violence and immigration cases.

Professor Laurie Kohn was a faculty member for GW’s week-long Course Design Institute, in which Professor Arturo Carrillo participated. Professor Kohn’s post on how to treat denials of allegations of domestic violence appeared on the February 21st blog of Ms. Magazine.

Professor Peter Meyers

In April 2018, Professor Joan Meier submitted written testimony to the Judiciary Committee of the D.C. Council about emergency protection order statutes that had been proposed to help prevent shootings, including mass shootings. Through DV LEAP, Professor Meier continues to handle multiple appeals in various state courts, including the Connecticut Supreme Court (in a case involving a tort action filed against an abuser for his violent assault), and two cutting-edge briefs in the D.C. Court of Appeals concerning implicit bias against abused women.

In May 2018, Professor Meier appeared on Legal Talk Network to discuss allegations of abusive behavior against New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. In April 2018, she was quoted in The Christian Science Monitor about the conversations on the #MeToo movement among anti-domestic violence advocates. In February 2018, Professor Meier was quoted in the Tampa Bay Times about why victims of intimate violence may choose not to report their

In March 2018, The Washington Post quoted Professor Peter Meyers on the constitutionality and the wisdom of the Trump administration’s suggestion that prosecutors address the opioid crisis by seeking the death penalty against drug dealers.

In fall 2017, Professor Jessica Steinberg testified before the D.C. Council on two pending bills. One of the bills would create a local clemency board. The other

Karimah Dosunmu, JD ’18

Karimah Dosunmu, JD ’18, Student Director of the Jacob Burns Community Legal Clinics during the 2017-18 academic year, organized a clinic-wide food drive in the spring semester, yielding a donation of several large boxes of food to Bread for the City. The Immigration Clinic was awarded a pizza party for contributing the most food to the collection effort. n Professor Jessica Steinberg

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INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Insight: Clinic Profiles Criminal Appeals and Post-Conviction Services Clinic

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n 2017-18, 10 third-year students in the Criminal Appeals and Post-Conviction Services (CAPS) Clinic, taught and supervised by Professor Anne Olesen and Adjunct Professor Wyatt Feeler, LLM ’13, represented clients in criminal appeals before the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. The clinic’s cases covered a range of appellate issues, including constitutional, statutory, and evidentiary issues.

Madeline DiLascia and Anagha Bharadwaj argued a constitutional issue— that a retrial would violate their client’s double jeopardy rights after his first trial ended in a mistrial requested by the prosecutor. During opening statement, defense counsel had mentioned potential rape shield evidence because it was arguably relevant to the murder charge in a rape/murder case. The students argued that applying the rape shield statute in this case violated the defendant’s right to present a complete defense and that instead of granting the mistrial, the trial court should at least have held a hearing to consider the evidence necessary to defend against the murder charge. In another case of constitutional dimension, Samantha Block and Jordan Green argued that their client was denied his constitutional right to adequately consult with counsel about whether to testify after the court determined that he could be impeached with his prior convictions. Meg Peterson argued that her client’s constitutional right to an unbiased jury was violated when the jury saw him shackled and escorted by officers in the courtroom.

CAPS students also raised significant jury instruction questions in their clients’ cases. Eric Hernandez and Sophia Herbst argued that the trial court had erred by failing to instruct the jury on mistake of fact when the defendant claimed that rather than violating a protective order

(l–r) Adjunct Professor Wyatt Feeler, student-attorneys Jordan Green and Anagha Bharadwaj, and Professor Anne Olesen at the Maryland Court of Special Appeals

he had accidentally encountered his ex-girlfriend. Student-attorneys Green and Dilascia argued that the trial judge erroneously refused to give a self-defense instruction in an assault case where the defendant claimed to have been attacked first by his accuser. In a case involving the jury selection process, Bharadwaj and Block claimed that the judge erred by failing to ask potential jurors whether they would give preference to police testimony. In a separate case, Bharadwaj and Dilascia argued that the trial judge erred by refusing to voir dire jurors on whether they would look unfavorably on a defendant who declined to testify.

Students also litigated cases involving improper prosecutorial argument (Herbst, Nate Krevor, and Gretchen Schumaker), the erroneous admission of evidence of prior bad acts (Schumaker and Peterson), a trial court’s error in allowing the testimony of a witness who attempted to invoke the privilege against self-incrimination, and a trial court’s failure to correct a legally inconsistent verdict where the jury found a defendant guilty of robbery but not guilty of assault, a lesser-included offense of the robbery (Hernandez and David Rifkin).

During 2017-18, the Maryland Court of Appeals, the highest court of the state, heard two cases previously handled by clinic students, both of which resulted in victories. In the first case, argued by Professor Olesen, the court held that the trial court had erred by giving a missing witness instruction that permitted the jury to make an unfavorable inference against the defendant based on the fact that his mother did not testify about his alibi. The Court of Appeals reasoned that missing witness instructions should rarely, if ever, be given at the behest of the prosecutor in a criminal case because they are at odds with fundamental constitutional principles, such as the prosecutor’s burden to prove its case and the defendant’s right to remain silent. In the second case, argued by Professor Feeler, the Court of Appeals found that the trial court violated the relevant Maryland rules when it failed to take any action on two letters the defendant sent prior to trial that expressed dissatisfaction with his counsel. The court further held that the defendant’s failure to speak about the letters in open court did not waive his right to request discharge of counsel. n

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INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Domestic Violence Project

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tudents in the Domestic Violence Project (DVP), directed by Professor Joan Meier, worked in domestic violence legal organizations in the D.C. area. In their placements, students were given a variety of responsibilities, such as representing clients, prosecuting domestic violence cases, and researching and drafting portions of appellate briefs.

Through classwork involving hands-on exercises, small-group discussions, self-reflection, and guided mentoring, students developed their lawyering skills and professional identities, while integrating their workplace experiences with an examination of domestic violence law, policy, and practice.

During the 2017-18 academic year, students in the DVP who were placed at the Domestic Violence Legal Empowerment and Appeals Project (DV LEAP), a nonprofit founded by Professor Meier primarily for appellate litigation, had an unusual opportunity to participate in a trial-level civil protection order case.

One of DV LEAP’s appellate clients had

become homeless after leaving her abusive home. DVP student Parisa Parooz, Class of ’19, arranged the collection of winter clothes and gift cards for the client and her children, a gesture that moved the client to tears.

After returning home to be with her children, both the client and the children continued to suffer further violence, including one incident involving a gun.

When the client contacted DV LEAP in desperation, Professor Meier persuaded a domestic violence shelter to take the client and her children. Having bonded with Professor Meier during her appeal and having felt unprotected and betrayed in other proceedings in the past, the client trusted only Professor Meier to provide legal help. With two new spring semester DVP students, Elizabeth Brown and Alexa Levy, both Class of ’19, Professor Meier began preparing an emergency civil protection order (CPO) case to try to protect the client and her children from the abuser. The students interviewed witnesses, gathered corroborative evidence, such as text messages and phone calls, and supported and prepared the children to testify. The testimony of the 10-year-old son convinced the court to grant the CPO, an experience that was

Professor Joan Meier

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empowering for the boy and important in teaching both children that their father’s abuse was not acceptable behavior.

During 2017-18, DVP students also worked at a number of other nonprofits on issues of domestic and sexual violence.

Christina Reese, JD ’18, who worked at Break the Cycle, spoke about the rapport she developed with her client and the client’s gratitude. The client said “she felt empowered and safe for the first time in over a year,” which led the student to appreciate being “part of an experience where our legal support could change someone’s life so much and so positively.”

Caroline Saunders, JD ’18, who worked with domestic violence survivors at the Legal Aid Society, commented that one of the things she’d learned was that “when confronted with the real pain, fear, and anguish of your clients,” it was critical to explain legal procedures “in a way that showed that the lawyers cared about and empathized with the client’s problem, even if [they] could not help…with that particular issue.”

Nicole Fleury, JD ’18, who worked on several projects at AMARA Legal Center, including expunging criminal records for sex trafficking survivors, saw her lawyering role as “truly transformative.” She had discovered “the many implications of having one’s record expunged for someone who was trafficked and forced into a dangerous and oppressive lifestyle,” and she wanted to enable these survivors to apply for jobs and gain access to certain services. Erin Chapman, JD ’18, who worked with the Montgomery County States’ Attorney’s office, observed that DVP classroom exercises valuably informed her fieldwork, commenting that “the concerns raised by the client in [the classroom] exercise are concerns that…I have been trying to keep… in mind when dealing with victims who are hesitant to participate in a case or worried about the consequences of a conviction.” By integrating their classwork and their fieldwork, students gained valuable understandings of domestic violence lawyering and lawyering in general. n

INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Family Justice Litigation Clinic

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n 2017-18, the Family Justice Litigation Clinic (FJLC) was directed by Visiting Associate Professor Erin Scheick while Professor Laurie Kohn was on sabbatical.

Each semester in the FJLC, second- and third-year students represent clients in family law matters, helping them obtain civil protection orders in domestic violence cases and litigate matters involving custody, child support, and family-related immigration issues.

In the fall semester, Emily Keil, JD ’18, and Benny Herskovitz, JD ’18, represented the maternal aunt of a 14-year-old teenager from El Salvador who had come to the United States alone after being abandoned by her father and threatened by criminal gangs in her home town.

With the students’ assistance, the client obtained sole physical and legal custody of the minor child, and the students were able to file for Special Immigrant Juvenile Status on behalf of the teen. The FJLC represented the teenager in immigration court, filing documents that someday may help the teenager to obtain lawful permanent residence in the United States.

Mariam Arbabi, JD ’18, and Amy Lopez, JD ’18, worked diligently in the fall semester with law enforcement officers in Texas, prompting the re-opening of an investigation into the workplace sexual assault of their client, a man from El Salvador. On his behalf, the students obtained their client’s certification for a U visa for a victim of crime and filed his U visa petition to secure his ability to remain in the United States to assist law enforcement. During the semester, the students also represented a homeless teenager in her civil protection order (CPO) case at D.C. Superior Court.

Students in the FJLC represented numerous clients seeking custody of their children from abusive or neglectful parents. Karimah Dosunmu, JD ’18, Iman Lyons, JD ’18, and Gabriella Botticelli, JD ’18, negotiated a custody arrangement for a woman seeking to protect her sons, both of whom have special needs, from her former partner who had been physically abusive. Dosunmu and Botticelli also represented another client seeking sole legal and physical custody of her three children, after the father had sexually abused the older female child. In the spring semester, Dosunmu and Botticelli secured a CPO for a client who had been physical assaulted by her boyfriend. Ms. Dosunmu remarked that the clinic is

Visiting Associate Professor Erin Scheick with Dean Phyllis Goldfarb

Visiting Associate Professor Erin Scheick

“what I am going to miss most about law school. It has truly prepared me for my post-law school life and career.”

In the spring semester, Renae Vanwick, JD ’18, and Claudia Lynch, Class of ’19, worked with a client in a complex custody and divorce case, and prepared a custody complaint for a mother seeking sole physical and legal custody of her 13-year-old daughter who had come to the United States from Honduras after fleeing abandonment and violence. Jerel Saul, JD ’18, and Ashley Sidle, JD ’18, managed the discovery phase of a complex divorce case and prepared it for trial. In addition, they provided support to a woman from El Salvador whose ex-husband had sexually abused their children and other children as well. Assisted by the students, the client filed for U visa certification and testified against her ex-husband.

As these examples reveal, clinic experiences help students develop valuable professional skills and promote their insights into the attorney-client relationship and other important issues.

At the same time, the students provide indispensable legal services to clients.

Throughout the year, students in the FJLC assisted many clients who had suffered violence, helping them to achieve safety, security, and stability. n

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INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Immigration Clinic

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tudents in the 2017-18 Immigration Clinic, directed by Professor Alberto Benitez and attorney Paulina Vera, JD ’15, helped a number of clients obtain asylum in the United States. Soon after graduating, student-attorney Priom Ahmed, JD ’18, won a grant of asylum for her client from the Ivory Coast. The client, a gay man, had suffered shaming and harassment throughout his life, including being banished from his home, and he fled the country after being physically attacked and seriously injured by perpetrators uttering homophobic slurs. In June 2018, the client wept when he learned that asylum had been granted.

In April 2018, student-attorney Fatimah Hameed, JD ’18, helped a client from Honduras and her two daughters obtain asylum in the United States after they fled death threats from gang members who had sexually assaulted one of the daughters when she was 13. After an elderly couple had intervened and helped the daughter escape, the gang sought to prevent the teenager and her family from seeking police assistance by threatening their lives. After hearing the basis for

their asylum application, an immigration judge granted them asylum, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement indicated they would appeal. The Immigration Clinic continues to represent the family on appeal.

Student-attorney Dana Florkowski, JD ’18, represented a client from El Salvador and her 18-year-old daughter.

The client had lived in the United States with a Salvadoran man who was removed to El Salvador after repeatedly abusing the client. Subsequently, the abuser threatened to kill the client’s mother and daughter, who were in El Salvador, unless the client returned to El Salvador.

In an effort to protect her family, the client returned, but when the abuse and threats to her and her daughter escalated, they fled to the United States.

Florkowski successfully argued that the client’s return to El Salvador had been under duress, and the immigration judge granted the asylum application for both mother and daughter. The Immigration Clinic is currently working to bring the client’s nine-year-old son to the United States to be reunited with his mother and sister.

Julia Navarro, JD ’18, represented the family of a client from El Salvador who sought asylum in the United States. After

Professor Alberto Benitez (far right) with the 2017-18 Immigration Clinic class.

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the mother and her 10-year-old son were attacked, beaten, and injured by gang members because they were resisting his recruitment into the gang, the parents decided that the mother should flee to the United States with the children. In February, an immigration judge granted the family’s asylum application. The ICE trial attorney waived appeal, so the grant is final. Granted asylum along with the client were her 12- and nine-year-old sons, who live with her, and her husband, who remains in El Salvador.

Solangel Gonzalez, Class of ’19, also represented an asylum applicant from El Salvador. When her client’s uncle was murdered and the client reported the murder to the police, gang members threatened to kill her and her children if she continued to cooperate with the police. When the client and her children moved to another part of El Salvador, gang members continued to pursue her there, leading her to bring her children to the United States. In January, the client’s asylum application was granted. Gisela Camba, JD ’18, represented a mother and her daughter from Honduras who fled to the United States when gang members threatened to kidnap the daughter and kill her family. Both mother and daughter were granted asylum in January. n

INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Law Students in Court

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uring the 2017-18 academic year, third-year students enrolled in the Criminal and Civil Divisions of D.C. Law Students in Court (LSIC) provided pro bono representation to indigent D.C. clients on a variety of matters, including landlord-tenant issues and criminal misdemeanor charges. In the yearlong Criminal Division, student-attorney Salma Attia represented a client suffering from mental illness in a system not designed to provide treatment.

Due to extensive pretrial litigation, she persuaded the government to dismiss each of her client’s cases before trial, then filed several successful motions to seal criminal records, including two on grounds of actual innocence. Andrea Cetra also represented clients with challenging mental health issues, leading her to contact psychiatrists at the D.C. jail to make sure her clients received appropriate medication.

When Tasha Pulvermacher obtained a dismissal of her client’s case, the client’s attorney on another case for which he was being held at D.C. jail was able to obtain a sentence of time served. Subsequently, she worked to ensure that her client retained supportive housing, filed several successful motions to seal criminal records—including three on grounds of actual innocence—and drafted an appellate brief raising novel constitutional issues. Samantha Montalbano conducted many court appearances on her clients’ behalf, and her client-centered approach to representation was evident throughout the year.

Antoinette Carradine represented her clients in a variety of hearings, from arraignments, to status hearings, sentencing hearings, and civil protection order hearings, persuading two judges to modify court orders, allowing her client to return home rather than face continued homelessness. She also drafted

several motions to seal criminal records.

Joshua Weber advocated on behalf of clients seeking expungement of their criminal records, writing persuasive arguments for why it was in the interests of justice to have the records sealed.

Ryan Farrell’s pretrial preparation and review of the government’s discovery was so thorough and well-researched that, in one case, he kept the government from introducing illegally obtained evidence and, in another case, he was able to get the charges dismissed with prejudice for the government’s violation of prosecutorial obligations to disclose exculpatory evidence. Taylor Halcromb effectively litigated pretrial issues and fully developed a case for trial, preparing several cross-examinations, and addressing the client’s mental health issues in the course of her representation.

Rosie Cole filed numerous pretrial motions—one of which asserted the

unconstitutionality of the government’s practice of drug-testing all arrestees without any particularized suspicion— and fully prepared two cases for trial.

The government dismissed both cases on the morning of trial. Jordan Stave fully prepared a case for trial, and as a result of his pretrial litigation and thorough investigation of the case, he was able to convince the government to dismiss the charges on the day of trial.

Conrad Blackburn drafted several motions to seal criminal records, prepared for probation revocation proceedings, and took a case to trial.

Relying on his extensive investigation and diligent preparation, he vigorously cross-examined witnesses and held the government to its burden of proof.

Overall, GW students obtained highly favorable outcomes for their clients and learned the meaning and value of zealous representation. n

LSIC Supervising Attorney David Blum, JD ‘15, with (l-r) Civil Division 3L students Austin Watkins, Grace Lee, and Delaney Barr.

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INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Prisoner and Reentry Clinic

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n 2017-18, the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic was directed by Visiting Associate Professor Katy Ramsey, while Professor Jessica Steinberg was on sabbatical. Under Professor Ramsey’s guidance, students in the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic provided various kinds of legal assistance to D.C. residents serving prison sentences. Students represented currently and formerly incarcerated clients seeking parole, reduction of minimum sentences, expungements, and other kinds of legal relief. The students’ representation entailed meeting with their incarcerated clients, interviewing relatives and friends, thoroughly investigating facts, researching applicable laws and regulations, filing motions and other legal documents, and advocating for their clients at hearings. During the course of the semester, every student led a one-hour classroom session focused on an important decision that had arisen in a case the student was handling, a pedagogical approach that enabled students

Professor Katy Ramsey and Milagros Tudela, Clinic Administrator

to participate in, and learn from, their classmates’ cases.

In 2017-18, Marta Bylica, JD ’18, and Kristine Abrenica, Class of ’19, won a motion in D.C. Superior Court to seal the arrest record of a client—the wife of a former client of the clinic— who was seeking funding to expand her outreach ministry in Southeast D.C. Although the client had had to report her arrest on job and grant applications since the

Professor Ramsey in class.

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1990s, the arrest had never resulted in a charge. The students interviewed the client, obtained her affidavit and affidavits of other witnesses to the arrest, researched the law governing expungement of arrests, and prepared a motion that a judge granted a few weeks after it was filed.

In November 2017, Vincent Glynn, JD ’18, and Matthew Smith, JD ’18, won a grant of parole for a client at his first hearing before the U.S. Parole Commission. The students worked closely with the client’s family to develop a viable release plan, one of the key factors in persuading the Parole Commission to release the client on parole after he had served 18 years in prison.

In the spring semester, Katherine Grabar, JD ’18, and Claire Pizurro, JD ’18, won a grant of parole after a hearing before the U.S. Parole Commission for a client who had served 22 years in prison.

After listening to audio recordings of the client’s previous parole hearings, the students determined that the client, who was not a native English speaker, had not received adequate interpretation services to enable him to understand the proceedings. For his next hearing, the students ensured that the client was provided with a certified interpreter, securing his rights to understand and participate in the process. n

INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Public Justice Advocacy Clinic

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n the fall semester, students in the Public Justice Advocacy Clinic (PJAC), taught and supervised by Professor Jeffrey Gutman, represented clients in a variety of civil litigation matters. Many of their clients were low-income workers whom the student-attorneys represented in wage and hour cases (i.e., lawsuits to obtain compensation owed them for work performed). They also represented clients in appeals from denials of unemployment compensation and other types of cases as well. Students cultivated their lawyering abilities as they investigated cases, drafted motions, prepared for hearings before administrative law judges, and researched appellate briefs.

In 2017-18, PJAC students handled a number of unusual matters. For example, Robert Hagans, JD ’18, worked on a consumer protection case in which his client paid a construction company approximately $3,000 for the purchase of building materials for home repairs. The company never purchased the materials or performed any repairs but kept the client’s money. Investigation revealed

that the construction company was unlicensed in the District of Columbia and operating illegally. When the company could not be located, Hagans served the defendant through the D.C. Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, drafted a default judgment, and successfully argued in court to obtain the judgment.

In the fall semester, student-attorneys Noelle Cozbar, JD ’18, and Soo Choi, JD ’18, took a case to help a client obtain a new ID to replace the ID card he had lost and that he needed to obtain a D.C. public housing apartment. When the client’s birth certificate couldn’t be located, the case became complex, continuing through the spring semester when it was taken over by studentattorneys David Coard, JD ’18, and Caroline Merlin, JD ’18. After spending months following numerous dead ends, the students persisted and ultimately prevailed not only in obtaining identification for their client but in reuniting him with his long lost family as well. For more details of this extraordinary clinic odyssey, see story on p. 1.

In another interesting case, PJAC students represented Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) when the organization sought

Professor Jeffrey Gutman and PJAC student Robert Hagans, JD ‘18

information from the Trump administration under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). After President Trump hosted a meeting in which he allegedly provided Russia’s ambassador and foreign minister with highly sensitive intelligence information, CREW filed a FOIA request for documents relating to the meeting and the subjects of the talks between the participants. The National Security Agency publicly stated that the President had not disclosed top-secret information, while also asserting that it could not confirm nor deny whether it had documents responsive to CREW’s request. In the fall semester, PJAC student-attorneys Ryan Derry, JD ’18, and Stephen Santulli, JD ’18, researched and drafted on CREW’s behalf a detailed appeal. After it was denied, spring semester student-attorneys Cozbar and Heather Herald, JD ’18, drafted and filed CREW’s federal FOIA complaint demanding release of the requested documents. n

Professor Gutman meets with students.

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INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Small Business and Community Economic Development Clinic

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n 2017-18, student attorneys in the Small Business and Community Economic Development (SBCED) Clinic, directed by Professor Susan Jones and Adjunct Professors Parag Khandhar and Dorcas Gilmore, represented a range of small businesses, nonprofit organizations, creative enterprises, social enterprises and worker cooperatives.

The student-attorneys helped clients with a broad range of transactional legal issues, including business entity formation, corporate governance, regulatory compliance, risk analysis, insurance, tax, and employment law matters. In addition, all of the student-attorneys were certified by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to prosecute trademark applications and advise their clients on trademark law issues. Together, the SBCED students provided well over 1,000 hours of pro bono legal services in the 2017-18 academic year.

Third-year students Eric AlbersFiedler, Lily Gebru, and Farhad Mirzadeh represented three different clients: a nonprofit organization supporting gender

equality, a limited liability enterprise designed to foster creativity while building community, and a worker cooperative enabling workers’ education and alternatives to low-wage work. Third-year student-attorneys Suzanne Hart, Brian Miller, and Nonye Ukoh represented a health and skin care company, and a for-profit media concern, along with two nonprofit organizations—one offering public education on human trafficking while helping human trafficking survivors and the other promoting the importance of math education.

Another team of student-attorneys, third-year students Jonathan Abrams, Devron Brown, Janise Bruno, and Daniela Estrada, represented a worker cooperative, a nonprofit organization facilitating cooperative work for immigrant women, and a workforce development/fashion nonprofit seeking to merge with another nonprofit. Devron Brown commented that in the SBCED Clinic, the professors “empower and respect the students, something that I really appreciate” and that they taught him “the importance of

Professor Susan Jones addressing clinic visitors.

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Professor Susan Jones talks with Professor Christopher Bracey.

stopping to reflect” to help you understand “not just where you’re going” but “where you’ve been.”

Andrea Johnson, Class of ’19, one of the SBCED Clinic’s student directors, represented a social enterprise, advising it on legal structure, products liability, and FDA regulations. Basel Musharbash, JD ’18, the clinic’s other student director, represented a nonprofit community development corporation (CDC). Musharbash helped the CDC file articles of incorporation and provided advice on corporate governance and securing a 501(c)(3) federal tax exemption.

During the academic year, SBCED student-attorneys also advanced the clinic’s action research on the law and policy of entrepreneurship for returning citizens. Collectively, they contributed to a white paper advocating for funding for the Incarceration to Incorporation Entrepreneurship Act, a D.C. law providing business education, training, and small loans to formerly incarcerated persons. n

INSIGHT: CLINIC PROFILES

Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic

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he Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic (VILC), taught by Adjunct Professors Cliff Shoemaker and Renée Gentry, is the only legal clinic in the country that allows student-attorneys to experience the practice of law in the unique field of vaccine injury litigation.

During two semesters in the clinic, students litigate cases seeking damages from a federal compensation fund for people who have suffered injuries and other adverse reactions from the administration of vaccines. While vaccines are essential to public health and injuries are rare, Congress created the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program in the 1980s to serve as a no-fault alternative to use of the traditional legal system for tort actions against vaccine manufacturers. All vaccine injury claims are litigated in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.

Throughout the 2017-18 academic year, student-attorneys deepened their understanding of the attorney-client relationship by conducting intake interviews with clients, gathering necessary information, keeping clients informed on the progress of their cases, and helping them navigate the complexities of the

court process. In representing their clients, students engaged with medical experts, special masters, and opposing counsel from the Civil Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).

Students integrated into their lawyering many of the concepts and theories learned in their weekly classroom seminar. Quickly mastering the substantive law relevant to representing clients injured by vaccines, the 15 students in the 2017-18 VILC developed lawyering skills while working in teams of three to represent 35 clients through various stages of the vaccine injury litigation process, including client intake, record collection, drafting of petitions, filing of supporting documentation, collaboration with experts, negotiation with DOJ attorneys, and obtaining fees.

In one case, student-attorney Raffi Garnighian, JD ’18, represented a client who was injured by a vaccine administered to him while he served time in a private federal prison. The student deepened his knowledge of the private prison health system, as well as the vaccine injury litigation system. In another case, Bernt “Bear” Bruun, Class of ’19, worked through a particularly challenging scenario where two adult daughters were helping their elderly mother file her claim, requiring him to determine legal power of attorney and power of attorney for

purposes of health care records. Chelsea Williams, JD ’18, prepared a detailed memo to her client reviewing the scientific weaknesses of her case as described by the expert, a leading immunologist, and Brittany DeVries, JD ’18, faced the unique challenge of representing three siblings alleging the same injuries from their vaccines.

In addition to representing clients, VILC student-attorneys participated in a lobbying initiative seeking to expand the number of special masters presiding over vaccine injury cases in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. Students contacted various state representatives urging them to support efforts to increase the number of special masters statutorily permitted under the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program from eight to at least 16 and to allow for a commensurate increase in the number of special masters with every 10 percent increase in filings.

This lobbying effort resulted in a meeting for Professor Gentry and student-attorney Bojana Kabronova, Class of ’19, at the office of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton. Through this effort, the VILC students learned the nature and value of systemic advocacy that goes beyond individual client representation and broadened their understanding of the range of skills that lawyers can bring to bear on behalf of their clients. n

Participants in the 2017-18 Vaccine Injury Litigation Clinic

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EVENTS

Events Scenes from the Clinic’s First Graduation Reception

CAPS student David Rifken

(l-r) Rooselie Brutus (SBCED and LSIC), David Coard (PJAC), Nonye Ukoh (SBCED), Devron Brown (SBCED), and Charnae Supplee (PJAC)

CAPS student Sophia Herbst and Professor Anne Olesen

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EVENTS

Professor Anne Olesen and CAPS student Anagha Bharadwaj talk with other students.

Karimah Dosunmu, student in DVP and FJLC and 2017-18 Student Director of Clinics

Priom Ahmed, who participated in both PJAC and Immigration Clinic JACOB BURNS COMMUNITY LEGAL CLINICS 1 7

SPOTLIGHT

Friedman Fellows from page 1

Public Justice Advocacy Clinic, directed

by Professor Jeffrey Gutman, and the International Human Rights Clinic, directed by Professor Arturo Carrillo.

After a subsequent year directing the International Human Rights Clinic during Professor Carrillo’s sabbatical, Professor Smith published her LLM thesis in the New York University Journal of Law and Social Change and obtained a tenure-track teaching position at the University of Arkansas.

Other Friedman Fellows also have launched successful careers in clinical education and public interest law.

Professor Amanda Spratley was a member of the 2008-10 inaugural class of Friedman Fellows, co-teaching and co-supervising with Professor Susan Jones in the Small Business and Community Economic Development (SBCED) Clinic. Following her fellowship, Professor Spratley was hired to direct a similar clinic as a tenuretrack clinical professor at the University of Massachusetts School of Law, and she is now completing a visitorship as a Visiting Practice Professor of Law in the Entrepreneurship Legal Clinic at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Two other Friedman Fellows who worked with Professor Jones in the SBCED Clinic are tenure-track faculty members at the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) David A. Clarke School of Law. Professor Jacqueline Lainez Flanagan has taught contracts and a tax clinic at UDC, and Professor Etienne Toussaint also has taught students in contracts as well as students enrolled in the Community Economic Development Clinic. In 2018-19, Professor Lainez will be visiting in the Janet R. Spragens Federal Tax Clinic at the American University Washington College of Law. Other Friedman Fellows are beginning new law school positions in 201819. Katy Ramsey, a 2015-17 Friedman Fellow, co-taught and co-supervised with Professor Jessica Steinberg in the Prisoner and Reentry Clinic, then directed the clinic in 2017-18 while Professor Steinberg was on sabbatical. Recently, Professor Ramsey moved to the University of Memphis School of Law to begin a tenure-track clinical teaching position in

a medical-legal partnership program. Her LLM thesis, “One Strike 2.0: How Local Governments Are Distorting a Flawed Federal Eviction Law,” is forthcoming in the UCLA Law Review.

Following her 2013-15 Friedman Fellowship, Claire Donohue served as a practitioner-in-residence in the Domestic Violence Clinic at American University Washington College of Law. In the fall semester, she begins a clinical teaching position in law and social work at Boston College Law School. Juliana Russo Siconolfi, a 2008-10 Friedman Fellow who has served as an adjunct professor in GW Law’s Field Placement Program, was recently named the new Director of Experiential Education at Georgetown University Law Center.

Some Friedman Fellows have gone on to distinguished careers in public interest law practice, and some have combined practice positions with law school teaching. After her 2009-11 Friedman Fellowship, Vanessa Batters-Thompson worked as a family law attorney at Bread for the City and is now a Managing Attorney at the D.C. Bar Pro Bono Center, where she oversees an attorney training program and a pro bono clinic. Training nearly 500 attorneys and paralegals a year and mentoring pro bono attorneys, Ms. Batters-Thompson indicates that in her work she “draws heavily from my Friedman Fellow days.” Erin Scheick, who co-taught and co-supervised with Professor Laurie Kohn in the Family Justice Litigation Clinic, then directed the clinic in 2017-18 when Professor Kohn was on sabbatical, has begun a position as a Senior Supervising Attorney at Bread for the City. Caroline Rogus, a 2011-13 Friedman Fellow in the Family Justice Litigation Clinic, has supervised GW Law students in the law school’s Family Court Pro Bono Project for a number of years.

After working as an appellate attorney at the Maryland Public Defender and serving from 2015-18 as an adjunct faculty member in the Criminal Appeals and Post-Conviction Services Clinic—the clinic in which he had worked with Professor Anne Olesen as a 2011-13 Friedman Fellow—Wyatt Feeler has begun a position through the U.S. Department of Justice as a defense

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Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb with (l–r) former Friedman Fellows Etienne Toussaint and Jacqueline Lainez Flanagan and Professor Susan Jones.

attorney for Guantanamo detainees.

After a three-year post-fellowship term as a practitioner-in-residence in the International Human Rights Clinic at American University Washington College of Law and a visitorship at Georgia State University, former Friedman Fellow Shana Tabak has accepted a position as Founding Director of the Tahrih Justice Center in Atlanta, a nonprofit that provides legal and social services to immigrant women and girls fleeing human rights abuse. Under Ms. Tabak’s leadership, Tahirih Atlanta is launching an Immigration Appeals Project to advance their clients’ goals.

Reflecting on the past 10 years of the Friedman Fellowship program, Associate Dean Phyllis Goldfarb expressed her satisfaction that the program had fulfilled its potential. “The fellowship program has been an effective incubator for talented attorneys to develop their skills as teachers, scholars, and public interest lawyers while they contribute to the professional development of GW’s clinical law students,” she observed. “After completing their two years of teaching, learning, and lawyering at GW Law and receiving LLM. degrees, Friedman Fellows have achieved many academic and professional successes.” Dean Goldfarb noted that the GW Friedman Fellowship program also has served as a model for other law schools and that she had consulted with faculty at a number of schools who were seeking to replicate what the fellowship program has accomplished here. n

SPOTLIGHT

Clinic Students Solve Mystery from page 1

fall semester, he told them that he had lost his District of Columbia identification card and wanted to obtain a new one so that he could return to live in D.C. public housing. This simple request turned into an odyssey of futility and despair, followed at last by discoveries, tears, and joy.

Interviewing Mr. P. about his background, Ms. Cozbar and Ms. Choi learned that he had never married and had no children. He recalled in detail particular childhood incidents from 50 years ago and had a bitter memory of being told many times by a foster parent when he was a young boy that his mother did not want him. But he had little information that would help in restoring his ID. He didn’t have a birth certificate, was unsure where he was born, didn’t know his birth parents’ names, and was unaware of any siblings.

Although Ms. Cozbar and Ms. Choi made numerous requests and conducted many searches, no D.C. court or agency found a file for Mr. P., no churches had baptismal records of him, and relatives of his deceased foster parents had no relevant information. The D.C. Division of Vital Records said they could not find his birth

certificate. No record in Mr. P.’s name was on file in Maryland or Virginia either.

The first breakthrough in the case came when Ms. Cozbar and Ms. Choi filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act to the Social Security Administration, which found a 1975 Social Security application listing the names of the client’s birth parents— names that he hadn’t known previously.

As the spring semester began, third-year student-attorneys David Coard and Caroline Merlin took over Mr. P.’s case, searching under his birth parents’ names for foster care records, marriage records, etc. These searches produced no additional information.

Undaunted, Ms. Merlin began genealogical research and found census records from the early 20th century under the name of the client’s father. Her further research identified a marriage license in Virginia for a woman a few years older than the client who lived in Pennsylvania and listed the same parents’ names as had been listed on the Social Security application.

At the client’s request, Ms. Merlin called the Pennsylvania woman, explaining that she was trying to help

a client get identification, stated the client’s name, and asked if she was connected to him. Upon hearing the student’s questions, the woman burst into tears, saying she had been trying to find her brother for 50 years. She explained that as a child, she had visited an orphanage and was told the name of her brother, who was said to be living there. She stated that she never forgot his name, insisted that her first grandson be given the same name, and always hoped that someday she would be reunited with her lost sibling. She reported that the client had seven other siblings and a large number of nieces and nephews, many of them living in the D.C. area.

Within days, the client’s sister arrived in D.C. and hosted a family reunion.

In May 2018, the family was reunited again in a D.C. courtroom for a hearing on a petition to correct Mr. P.’s birth certificate. Mr. Coard had finally obtained Mr. P.’s birth certificate from the Division of Vital Records, but it did not include his full name. The judge permitted Mr. Coard to report in detail the long search required to obtain Mr. P.’s identification and to explain how the search had led to a family’s overdue reunification. When he finished the story, there were no dry eyes in the courtroom.

The judge asked the family members who attended the hearing to introduce themselves, congratulated the students, and granted the petition.

Little did the students expect that their semester in clinic would bring them a 50-year-old mystery to solve. Yet because of their belief in their client and their doggedness in the face of initial disappointments and frustrations, a man who had been without relatives throughout his life was reunited with his large, extended family. It was an unusual but unforgettable case—a testament to the power of clinical education—that transformed many lives forever. n

PJAC students Noelle Coxbar, Caroline Merlin, Soo Choi, and David Coard

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