WASHINGTON, DC, October 29, 2002 — The National Legal Aid & Defender Association (NLADA) is pleased to announce this year's winners of the prestigious Reginald Heber Smith Award (the “Reggie”) are Webb Brewer, litigation director for Memphis Area Legal Services, Inc., of Tennessee, and David Feige, trial chief with The Bronx Defenders, of New York. Brewer and Feige will be honored during the NLADA 2002 Annual Conference Awards Dinner on Friday, November 15, at the Hilton Milwaukee City Center in Wisconsin.

The "Reggie" celebrates the outstanding achievements and dedicated services of an attorney for contributions made while employed by an organization providing civil legal services or indigent defense services. These two gentlemen have distinguished themselves throughout their respective careers by zealously pursuing justice for their clients. Each has used his knowledge and skill to improve the lives of the disenfranchised and to make social policies and justice fair and accessible to all.

Since his graduation from the University of Memphis (Cecil C. Humphreys) School of Law, where he was a member of the law review, Brewer has worked tirelessly to address the civil legal needs of low-income people in the Memphis community. He has successfully represented clients in a number of “impact” lawsuits, several of them class actions, particularly in the areas of housing discrimination and civil rights violations. In the last several years, he has successfully represented appellants in four important Tennessee Supreme Court cases. Currently, he is representing clients in two massive predatory lending lawsuits in the United States District Court and a major fair housing case regarding architectural barriers for people with disabilities in multifamily housing. In addition, he is working on several federal employment discrimination cases involving disability and Family Medical Leave issues, and several significant special education cases.

His prior achievements include an effort to get funding from the City of Memphis to open the Memphis Fair Housing Center in 1998, and in 1999 he was instrumental in obtaining additional funding from the city to operate the Home Preservation Project to combat predatory lending in the Memphis area. Brewer drafted an innovative Fair Housing Ordinance for the City of Memphis, which was enacted by the Memphis City Council earlier this year. The ordinance prohibits local property owners from refusing to rent to tenants because they are Section 8 voucher recipients.

Memphis Area Legal Services, Inc., Board President Andrew Branham states in his nomination letter, "Meaningful change never comes without some discomfort and, when advocating for important issues in behalf of our clients, Webb has remained impervious to the pressures brought to bear by those who oppose his position. Through his work, Webb has had an immeasurable effect in improving the plight of so many in Memphis, especially the poor, the sick, the disabled, the exploited, the marginalized and the disenfranchised. As Memphis' most effective public interest lawyer, Webb has made it his life's work to comfort the distressed and distress the comfortable."

This year's other Reggie winner, Feige, is yet another inspirational example. In February of 2001, Feige filed the first motion seeking to force the New York City Police Department to use a double blind sequential lineup. He lost. But since then he has continued to press the issue, lecturing throughout the country and providing support and guidance to those who seek to challenge lineups in their own jurisdictions.

He handles homicide and serious felony cases, and conducts in-house trainings on trial skills and felony practice. He shares his skills and enthusiasm outside The Bronx Defenders by teaching at the Rutgers and Hofstra universities’ intensive trial advocacy programs, and for the New York County Lawyers Association and the National Institute of Trial Advocacy. In addition, he is on the faculty of the National Criminal Defense College.

Feige is committed not only to the direct client work of being a public defender but also to changing attitudes toward the work public defenders do, he is relentless about using the media to shape the attitudes and change the perspective of the reading, listening and viewing public. His April 2001 article in the New York Times Magazine titled “How to Defend Someone You Know is Guilty” explained how it is that a public defender cannot only represent, but also care for clients — even guilty ones. Feige’s views on the criminal justice system have appeared on the op ed page of The New York Times, Slate, Legal Affairs, and The Champion. His radio commentaries are heard on both WNYC and NPR, and he is a regular commentator for Court TV where he passionately asserts the defender perspective.

In a nomination letter, Robin Steinberg, executive director of The Bronx Defenders, states, "David touches the lives of his individual clients, pushes the boundaries of legal practice through creative litigation, and fiercely advocates for justice in the local and national press. His unique sequential lineup litigation and national efforts to persuade other defenders to push their jurisdictions to employ fairer lineup procedures demonstrate David's inspirational determination to make the criminal justice system fairer. … I have no doubt that he will succeed in his quest, and, as a result, we in the justice community will hold our heads up a little higher and a little more proudly."

For more information on NLADA awards, visit www.nlada.org.

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The National Legal Aid & Defender Association (NLADA) champions effective legal assistance for people who cannot afford counsel, serves as a collective voice for both civil legal services and public defense services throughout the nation and provides a wide range of services and benefits to its individual and organizational members. Founded in 1911, NLADA is the oldest and largest national, nonprofit membership organization devoting all of its resources to advocating equal access to justice for all Americans.