Honorable Bernice B. Donald, U.S. Circuit Judge, Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals
Keynote Speaker
Hon. Bernice Donald is a Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. She was nominated to that position by President Barack Obama and was confirmed by a vote in the Senate on September 6, 2011. Prior to that, Judge Donald sat on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee. She was appointed to the district court by President William Jefferson Clinton in December 1995. She was sworn into office in January 1996. She previously served as Judge of U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Tennessee, becoming the first African American woman in the history of the United States to serve as a bankruptcy judge. In 1982, she was elected to the General Sessions Criminal Court, where she became the first African American woman to serve as a judge in the history of the State of Tennessee. She received her law degree from the University of Memphis School of Law where she has served as an adjunct faculty member. She also serves as faculty for the Federal Judicial Center and the National Judicial College. In 1996, Chief Justice Rehnquist appointed Judge Donald to the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Bankruptcy Rules where she served for six years. She is extremely active in the American, Tennessee, and Memphis Bar Associations, serving in vital leadership roles in key committees. She currently serves as Secretary of the 430,000 member American Bar Association.
Judge Donald has served as faculty for numerous international programs, including Romania, Turkey, Brazil, and Russia. Judge Donald lectured in various Republics of the former Soviet Union, including Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan, Kazan, Moscow, and Kransnador. In 2003, Judge Donald led a People to People delegation to Johannesburg, and Capetown, South Africa. In June 2003, Judge Donald traveled to Zimbabwe to monitor the trial of a judge accused of judicial misconduct.
Judge Donald has served as President of the National Association of Women Judges and the Association of Women Attorneys. She has chaired the Memphis Diversity Institute and the Commission on Opportunities for Minorities in the legal profession. She currently works with Leadership Memphis to provide leadership training for Memphis Housing Authority residents. And in June 2003, Judge Donald co-founded 4-Life, and skills training and enrichment program for students 6 - 15 designed to teach children to become positive productive citizens. Judge Donald is a member of ZETA PHI BETA Sorority.
Judge Donald has been the recipient of over 100 awards for professional, civic, and community activities, including the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Memphis, the Martin Luther King Community Service Award, and the Benjamin Hooks Award presented in 2002 by the Memphis Bar Foundation.
Judge Donald is married to W. L. Donald, and is the daughter of Mrs. Willie Bell Bowie and the deceased Perry Bowie. Judge Donald is a member of Greater Middle Baptist Church, pastored by Reverend Robert Mason.
Her motto is: Each day is a gift from God —the service that we render is our gift to God.
Desmond Meade
Keynote Speaker
Desmond Meade is a formerly homeless returning citizen who overcame many obstacles to eventually become president of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition (FRRC), chair of Floridians for a Fair Democracy, a graduate of Miami Dade College and Florida International University College of Law, and a Ford Global Fellow.
Recognized by Time Magazine as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2019, Desmond currently leads efforts to empower and civically re-engage local communities across the state and to reshape local, state, and national criminal justice policies. His work has resulted in his being named Floridian and Central Floridian of the Year 2019.
As president and executive director of FRRC, which is recognized for its work on voting and criminal justice reform issues, Desmond led the FRRC to a historic victory in 2018 with the successful passage of Amendment 4, a grassroots citizen’s initiative that restored voting rights to more than 1.4 million Floridians with past felony convictions. Amendment 4 represented the single largest expansion of voting rights in the United States in half a century and brought an end to 150 years of a Jim Crow-era law in Florida.
A sought-after speaker, Desmond has made numerous appearances on radio and television and has spoken before national organizations such as the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and Bread for the World. Desmond has testified before congressional members and staffers and was a part of a delegation to the United Nations, where he gave testimony regarding disenfranchisement in Florida. Desmond orchestrated a historic meeting at the White House between returning citizens and the Obama Administration. Most recently, Desmond served as a commissioner on the National Commission on COVID-19 and Criminal Justice, which was co-chaired by former U.S. Attorneys General Loretta Lynch and Alberto Gonzalez. He is also a member of the Council on Criminal Justice. He has appeared on numerous shows, including as Al-Jazeera, Democracy NOW, MSNBC with Joy Ann Reid, FOX News with Dana Perino and Tucker Carlson, Samantha Bee, and All In with Chris Hayes. He is a guest columnist for the Huffington Post, where one of his articles about the death of Trayvon Martin garnered national attention. Desmond has been featured in several newspaper and magazine articles and was chosen as a “Game Changer” by Politic 365, as well as being recognized as a “Foot Soldier” on the Melissa Harris-Perry Show on MSNBC. Desmond is married and has five beautiful children.
Jonodev Osceola Chaudhuri, Muscogee (Creek) Nation Ambassador
Keynote Speaker
Before becoming the ambassador of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, Jonodev Osceola Chaudhuri was the sixth presidentially appointed and Senate-confirmed chair of the National Indian Gaming Commission (NIGC). Chairman Chaudhuri was previously appointed to the Commission by Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and served brief turns as vice chair and associate commissioner before being designated as acting NIGC chairman by President Obama in October 2013.
Mr. Chaudhuri brings to the NIGC extensive policy, legal, and judicial experience and a lifelong commitment to serving the Native American community. His varied experiences each stem from his understanding of the connection between the development of strong governmental institutions and Native American self-determination.
Before joining the NIGC, Mr. Chaudhuri was senior counselor to the Department of the Interior’s Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, where he provided guidance and assistance on a wide range of national policy issues including Indian gaming, economic development, energy, Alaskan affairs, and tribal recognition.
Mr. Chaudhuri has practiced law for more than 15 years, primarily in private practice representing tribal nations and commercial entities. Additionally, Mr. Chaudhuri served as a judge on five different tribal courts, including serving as Chief Justice of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Supreme Court, the highest court of the fourth largest tribe in the Nation. Mr. Chaudhuri’s professional background also includes service as a community organizer, adjunct professor, public defender, legal services director, and author.
Originally from Tempe, Arizona, but very much tied to his family roots in Oklahoma, Mr. Chaudhuri graduated in 1993 with a B.A. from Dartmouth College and a J.D. from Cornell Law School in 1999. Mr. Chaudhuri’s volunteer and lifetime service has been spent on many issues regarding underrepresented communities.
Ugochi Anaebere-Nicholson
Ugochi serves as the directing attorney for the Housing and Homelessness Prevention Unit PLC. Before joining PLC, Ugochi served as managing attorney for the Indio Branch Office of Inland Counties Legal Services, where she supervised advocates and support staff and represented low-income residents of Coachella Valley. There she maintained a portfolio in a wide variety of areas, including housing (eviction defense), public benefits, family, and immigration law (U-Visa and VAWA).
Ugochi was also a legal aid attorney in Los Angeles with Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County’s Housing and Consumer Law Team, and she directed pro bono legal services in the Central Valley at Central California Legal Services. Ugochi earned her Bachelor’s of Arts Degree in Political Science from UCLA and her Juris Doctor Degree from Southwestern Law School.
Stuart Axenfeld
Stuart Axenfeld is the deputy director for fiscal compliance with the Legal Services Corporation’s (LSC) Office of Compliance and Enforcement (OCE). Mr. Axenfeld was the assistant inspector general for audit at the Corporation for National & Community Service-Office of Inspector General and supervised the work of audit managers, auditors, and audit contractors. Mr. Axenfeld began his federal career with the Defense Contract Audit Agency, where he led a team of auditors charged with reviewing massive and complex Pentagon contracts. He then served the Office of Inspector General at the Library Congress where, as senior auditor, he led a team that audited the Library’s programs, contracts, and grants. A native of Washington, D.C., Mr. Axenfeld received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland.
Betty Balli Torres
Betty has dedicated her professional career to public interest work serving as an advocate for civil legal services for the poor. She has served as the executive director of the Texas Access to Justice Foundation, the largest funding source for legal services to the poor in Texas, since 2001. Betty started as a staff attorney at Legal Aid of Central Texas after graduating from the University of Texas School of Law. She has held various public interest law positions, including executive director of Laredo Legal Aid Society, Inc., legal director of Volunteer Legal Services of Central Texas, managing attorney of Legal Aid of Central Texas, and as a staff attorney at Advocacy, Inc. Betty has served on many local, statewide and national committees, boards, and task forces related to access to justice. She is a past president of the National Association of IOLTA Programs, past co-chair of the Board of Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees and past-chair of the Hispanic Issues Section of the State Bar of Texas. She serves as co-chair of the ABA’s Working Group on Unaccompanied Minors, serves on the boards of Management Information Exchange (MIE) and ProBonoNet, and is a member of the Texas Human Trafficking Prevention Task Force. She has been appointed to serve as the chair of the American Bar Association (ABA) Commission on Hispanic Legal Rights and Responsibilities, special advisor to the ABA Commission on Immigration, and as a member of the ABA Center for Diversity and Inclusion.
Twitter: @BBalliTorres
Jennifer Bentley
Jennifer Bentley has served as the executive director of the Michigan State Bar Foundation since January 2017. The MSBF provides leadership and funding to advance access to justice for the poor and improve the administration of justice. Jennifer has dedicated her career to civil legal aid in various roles including staff attorney, managing attorney and chief development officer. Jennifer obtained her law degree from Indiana University and subsequently obtained her Certificate in Fundraising Management from the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. Jennifer has provided leadership, through planning, innovation and resource development, to many statewide initiatives to increase access to justice. In addition to many statewide task forces and committees, Jennifer serves on the board of directors of Management Information Exchange and as the board president of the National Association of IOLTA Programs.
Twitter: @MSBFDirector
Carol Bergman
Carol Bergman is the vice president for Government Relations and Public Affairs at the Legal Services Corporation, where she has worked since March 2012, and is responsible for managing LSC's communications and relationship with Congress, the executive branch, the media, and the public. Carol has been engaged in federal legislative and policy work for more than 25 years. She served as director of legislative affairs for drug policy in the Clinton White House and as associate counsel for the Committee on Government Operations in the U.S. House of Representatives under Chairman John Conyers. She has also worked for several non-governmental organizations on a wide range of domestic and international issues that disproportionately affect poor people, including HIV/AIDS, domestic violence, and criminal justice reform.
Jennifer Blunt
Jacquelynne Bowman
Jacquelynne J. Bowman became GBLS' Executive Director in August 2011 and is responsible for the overall management and operations of GBLS. She initially started work at GBLS as a senior attorney and then Managing Attorney of the Family Law Unit. She left GBLS in 1991, to work at MLRI as the state support attorney for family and juvenile law matters. Jacqui returned to GBLS in 1998, first as an Associate Director and then later became the Deputy Director. She is a nationally recognized expert in family and juvenile law as well as in law practice management. She serves on the Access to Justice Commission of the SJC as well as several boards of non-profit organizations.
Geoffrey Burkhart
Mr. Burkhart comes to the Texas Indigent Defense Commission from the American Bar Association (ABA), where he served as the first Deputy Director and Counsel to the ABA Center for Innovation. He also helped lead the ABA’s indigent defense reform efforts as Project Director and Counsel to the ABA Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defendants. Mr. Burkhart previously worked as an Assistant Appellate Defender at the Illinois Office of the State Appellate Defender. There, he represented clients in homicide, sexual assault, and other serious felony cases. He also worked at a law firm, served as a law clerk to Justice James Epstein of the Illinois Appellate Court, and taught Appellate Advocacy and Judicial & Scholarly Writing at Loyola University Chicago School of Law. Born and raised in Kentucky, Mr. Burkhart achieved the rank of Eagle Scout and earned his bachelor’s degree at Xavier University, his master’s degree at Loyola University Chicago, and his juris doctor at DePaul University College of Law, where he served as Editor in Chief of the DePaul Law Review. He frequently writes and speaks about criminal justice.
Wes Caines
Wesley Caines is a Bronx native of Caribbean heritage and the proud father of two children, Ashley and Gregory. A graduate of Bard College and New York Theological Seminary, his life’s journey has enriched him with a perspective on the importance of human connection and community engagement. Wes is a frequent speaker at colleges and universities as well as on panels and in conferences across the country on his exceptional personal journey and how it informs his work in criminal justice reform.
As Chief of Staff, Wes spearheads the organization’s systemic reform efforts which includes overseeing the policy, impact litigation and community organizing, teams. Prior to his current role, he was Director of Reentry & Community Engagement, roles which allowed him to work closely with directly impacted communities in understanding and developing strategies to overcome barriers that perpetually punish those ensnared in government systems.
Before joining The Bronx Defenders, Wes worked at Brooklyn Defender Services and launched the Records Accuracy Project which utilized local area law students to identify and correct RAP (records of arrest and prosecution) sheet errors. To date, he has trained nearly 50 law students in the complex world of reentry and reentry policy work. Wes sits on the boards of the Correctional Association of New York, Inside Change, Brooklyn Community Bail Fund, and Network Support Services, Inc.,–leveraging his expertise in the furtherance of helping those who are economically and socially disadvantaged to improve their systems involvement outcomes. Wes is a member of the New York City Bar, Reentry Subcommittee, a former member of the American Bar Association, Criminal Justice Section, and a founding member of the National Justice Impacted Bar Association. Wes’ life goal is the empowerment of underserved and marginalized communities as they become creative self-advocates who challenge policy-makers’ notion of the social contract.
Twitter: @bm_mansamusa
Corrine Campbell
Corrine Campbell is a fiscal compliance analyst with the Legal Services Corporation’s Office of Compliance and Enforcement. She previously worked as a risk manager for a health services nonprofit where she collaborated with executive management to design and implement the organization’s enterprise risk management program. Ms. Campbell began her career in 2009 as a forensic accountant in public accounting, focusing primarily on anti-money laundering. She earned a Master of Science in Business and Management with a concentration in Internal Audit from the University of Maryland and a Bachelor of Science in Accounting from Howard University.
Jayme Cassidy
Jayme always knew that she had a passion to help people. From an early age she was taught that “strong people don’t put each other down, they lift each other up.” Jayme was raised by her single parent mom, a retired Air Force Veteran. Her mom worked hard to provide Jayme a great education and she was determined to do something important with that gift. Jayme received the Pro Bono Service Award when she graduated from Seton Hall College of Law. She enjoyed her work as a litigator in private practice, working in New York, New Jersey and Florida. Jayme made a conscious decision to follow her passion. She has dedicated her legal career to providing legal assistance to those who cannot afford it.
Leonor Cortez
Colleen Cotter
Colleen Cotter has been the executive director of the Legal Aid Society of Cleveland since 2005. Cleveland Legal Aid provides civil legal assistance to 8,000 clients each year, focusing on safety and health, education and economic stability, shelter, and ensuring government agencies and the justice system are accountable and accessible. She serves as president of the board of directors of the Saint Luke’s Foundation and president of the United Way of Greater Cleveland Council of Agency Executives. Colleen worked for Indiana Legal Services and Pine Tree Legal Assistance in Maine as a Skadden Fellow. She clerked for the Honorable Cornelia Kennedy of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Colleen received her JD, summa cum laude, from Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington and her BA, cum laude, from the University of Notre Dame.
Mary DeFusco
As a distinguished Public Defender with over thirty years of experience, Ms. DeFusco serves as the Director of Training and Recruitment for the Defender Association of Philadelphia.
Aside from her formal duty, Ms. DeFusco continues to represent clients in court, namely Project Dawn Court. Ms. DeFusco co-founded Project Dawn Court in 2010, which is uniquely geared towards problem solving for victims of commercial sexual exploitation. Through Project Dawn Court, Ms. DeFusco is able to collaborate with the judiciary, prosecutors, and social service professionals to address victim needs. Outside of court, Ms. DeFusco actively engages in raising community and judicial awareness on the issues surrounding prostitution, sex trafficking, and exploitation.
In further pursuit of her philanthropic interests, Ms. DeFusco co-founded Dawn’s Place, a local residential program committed to providing survivors of commercial sexual exploitation with the critical social enhancement, life skills, therapy, and educational services necessary for their full recovery. Today, Ms. DeFusco serves on the Board of Directors for Dawn’s Place. Ms. DeFusco serves as an Adjunct Professor in Trial Advocacy at both Villanova and Temple University Schools of Law. In addition she has been an instructor, an Assistant Team Leader, and a Co-Team Leader for the National Institute for Trial Advocacy since 1991.
Ms. DeFusco received her Juris Doctorate from Temple University School of Law and her BA from the University of Pennsylvania. She has been an Advisor on our Board since 2014.
Shubi Deoras
Shubhangi (Shubi) Deoras is an attorney licensed in Illinois and currently serves as Counsel/Director for the ABA Resource Center for Access to Justice Initiatives (a project of the ABA Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defense (SCLAID)). She held the position of Assistant Counsel to the ABA Commission on IOLTA from 2014 – 2018. Between 2008 – 2014, Ms. Deoras provided consulting services to SCLAID on civil right to counsel activities, during which time she assisted in producing the ABA Directory on Law Governing Appointment of Counsel in State Civil Proceedings. Prior to 2008, Ms. Deoras provided consulting services on a variety of civil and/or criminal justice system matters to the Ford Foundation, the Illinois Juvenile Justice Initiative, and the National Legal Aid and Defender Association. She also served as Assistant Counsel to SCLAID from 2000 – 2005, providing staff support for the SCLAID’s indigent defense activities, including the development of ABA policy resolutions, reports, and standards relating to indigent defense services and delivery systems. Ms. Deoras received her J.D. from Boston University School of Law and a B.A. in Economics from Washington University in St. Louis.
Tanya Douglas
Tanya Douglas is the Director of the Disability Advocacy Project (DAP) at Manhattan Legal Services (MLS) and coordinates the Veterans Justice Project at MLS which is a program of Legal Services NYC. Tanya is a graduate of Cornell University and Cornell Law School. Tanya has spent her entire legal career as a public interest attorney with Legal Services NYC and has represented clients in SSI/SSD, education, public benefits and housing cases.
Tanya has spent a significant amount of her legal career focused on diversity and cultural competency matters for legal services/legal aid programs. She is the chair of the first ever Legal Services NYC’s Diversity Committee. Tanya is the co-facilitator of the New York State Legal Services/Legal Aid Diversity Coalition whose mission is to increase diversity in legal services/legal aid and increase cultural competency of legal services/legal aid staff. Tanya has offered trainings on cultural competency, diversity, and language access issues at local and national conferences. She has been a member of the MIE Training Committee and a trainer in MIE events, especially Supervising Legal Work, for a dozen years.
Molly Dull
Twitter: @mollydull
Maria Duvuvuei
Maria Duvuvuei is Director of Development and Communications for Community Legal Aid. Maria came to Legal Aid in 2016. With over a decade of communications experience, her career has focused on. As Director of Development and Communications, she oversees marketing, public relations, media relations, donor relations, fundraising, internal communications, and community engagement for the eight counties in the organization's service area. Prior to her role at Legal Aid, Maria was Communications Manager for Staff Engagement and Support at the Cleveland Clinic. In this role, she was responsible for internal communication strategies, including executive presentations, web design, content development, and marketing materials for over 4,000 international professional scientists and physician staff. Maria earned her bachelor’s degree in communication studies from Kent State University, where she studied journalism, editorial planning, team communication, and cultural communication.
Twitter: @mduvuvuei
Merf Ehman
As executive director of Columbia Legal Services (CLS), I’m leading organization-wide efforts to prioritize advocacy that supports community-led social justice movements that transform racialized systems and eradicate racism. Organizationally, CLS and I are focused on creating an adaptive organization that prioritizes anti-racist efforts internally and externally, and learning how to use our legal skills to support and build collective power around initiatives identified by the communities most impacted. I credit the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond for training, supporting, and challenging me and CLS staff on what it means to be an anti-racist organization and for informing the personal, internal work that I need to do as a white person and leader.
More than 25 years ago, I was a client in a welfare-to-work program at a local legal aid office, and now lead a legal aid organization working to change the world for the better. My life experience has been informed by other people believing that I could be more, and do more, than the limited options that felt available. People and institutions supported me in moving beyond the challenges of poverty, mental illness, and substance abuse to an unimaginably wonderful life. I want those same organizations, people, and institutions to work toward ending racism so that all people enjoy a full life free from trauma and abuse. Additionally, I prefer to be as pronoun free as possible.
Twitter: @EhmanMerf
Teresa Enriquez
Victoria Esposito
Victoria joined LASNNY in May 2011 as a staff attorney in the Canton office and became a senior attorney in January 2014. She has handled a variety of cases, including disability, eviction, family law, and foreclosure proceedings, and has filed numerous federal appeals in disability cases.
Before coming to LASNNY, Victoria was an Assistant District Attorney for St. Lawrence County, where she served as the appellate prosecutor in addition to prosecuting misdemeanors and felonies. She also taught aspiring law enforcement officers, and helped train Sexual Assault Nurse Examiners (S.A.N.E.s) at the David E. Sullivan Law Enforcement Academy.
From 2001-2006, Victoria taught subjects ranging from English to Constitutional Law at SUNY Canton, to national and international students. She also taught political science in partnership with the Xi’an International Studies University, and wrote SUNY-Canton’s Legal Studies program, a four-year paralegal program, the first of its kind within the SUNY system.
Victoria received her law degree and B.A., from the University of Notre Dame. Victoria is the co-author, with Professor David Pratt, of the Social Security and Medicare Answer book.
Twitter: @proudadvocate
Ron Flagg
Ron Flagg was appointed president of the Legal Services Corporation effective February 20, 2020, and previously served as vice president for legal affairs and general counsel since 2013. He previously practiced commercial and administrative litigation at Sidley Austin LLP for 31 years, 27 years as a partner. He chaired the firm’s Committee on Pro Bono and Public Interest Law for more than a decade.
Flagg served as president of the District of Columbia Bar in 2010-2011 and currently serves as chair of the Bar’s Pro Bono Task Force and on the board of the DC Bar Foundation. He also previously served as chair of the board of the National Veterans Legal Services Program, chair of the District of Columbia Bar Pro Bono Center, chair of the board of the AARP Legal Counsel for the Elderly, and as a member of the American Bar Association’s House of Delegates, the board of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, and the District of Columbia Judicial Nomination Commission.
Flagg graduated with honors from the University of Chicago and cum laude from Harvard Law School. He began his career as a law clerk to Judge Myron L. Gordon, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and as attorney-advisor in the United States Department of Justice, Office of Intelligence Policy.
Twitter: @ron_flagg
Mark Freedman
Mark Freedman is the senior associate general counsel for the Office of Legal Affairs at the Legal Services Corporation. Mark has worked in the LSC Office of Legal Affairs for 20 years providing advice and analysis regarding grantmaking, grant oversight, and compliance with the LSC statutes, regulations, and other requirements. Mark began his legal career at the Ithaca, New York, office of Legal Aid of Western New York.
Tanya Gassenheimer
Tanya Gassenheimer advocates for parent-centered systemic change in keeping families together and out of the child welfare system. She focuses on the disproportionate, unjust, and devastating impact the system has on families and communities of color. Tanya is in the process of developing strategy, which could include policy work, litigation, and/or administrative advocacy, around how best to achieve movement toward these goals. She seeks to center the voices of impacted parents in driving advocacy efforts. Before joining the Shriver Center on Poverty Law, Tanya represented youth at the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless on a variety of legal matters, particularly in the arena of healthcare and public support programs. She has also defended tenants against eviction and against termination of housing subsidies while at LAF. Tanya holds a Master of Social Work that she actively works to incorporate into her legal practice. She is a transplant from the East Coast and enjoys the continued journey of adjusting to life in the Midwest.
Twitter: @TGassenheimer
Kavita Goyal
Kavita Goyal has served as the Community Partnership Coordinator at the Defender Association of Philadelphia since 2017. In this role, Kavita helps the Defender develop meaningful collaborations with community groups and provide interactive training for individuals and organizations to support people involved in the justice system. Kavita’s work includes partnering with the Participatory Defense movement in Philadelphia and nationally.
Prior to her work at Defender, Kavita has served as Associate Director at the Nonprofit Executive Leadership Institute and as Program Director for school-based mentorship and educational programs at the Center for Humanistic Change. She earned her MS in Education at the University of Pennsylvania and has over 20 years experience as an educator, nonprofit manager, and community organizer.
Margaret Hagen
Margaret Hagan is the Director of the Legal Design Lab and a lecturer at Stanford Institute of Design (the d.school). She was a fellow at the d.school from 2013-2014, where she launched the Program for Legal Tech & Design, experimenting in how design can make legal services more usable, useful & engaging. She teaches a series of project-based classes, with interdisciplinary student groups tackling legal challenges through user-focused research and design of new legal products and services. She also leads workshops to train legal professionals in the design process, to produce client-focused innovation. Margaret graduated from Stanford Law School in June 2013. She served as a student fellow at the Center for Internet & Society and president of the Stanford Law and Technology Association. While a student, she built the game app Law Dojo to make studying for law school classes more interactive & engaging. She also started the blog Open Law Lab to document legal innovation and design work. Margaret holds an AB from the University of Chicago, an MA from Central European University in Budapest, and a PhD from Queen’s University Belfast in International Politics. She is originally from Pittsburgh.
Twitter: @margarethagan
Selena Hunn
Ishmael Jaffree
Ishmael Jaffree, civil rights activist and pro bono attorney with Legal Services Alabama (LSA), is a recipient of the 2021 Kutak-Dodds Prize from the National Legal Aid and Defender Association (NLADA). In 2020 Jaffree successfully managed a pilot program at LSA that secured qualified clients with rental relief and placed legal services personnel within the court so judges could directly refer unrepresented clients to LSA. Despite being retired, he still provided representation to over 100 clients facing eviction during the pandemic. Jaffree’s career exemplifies a lifelong dedication to civil rights through the work of law. Shortly after passing the bar Jaffree joined LSA to manage the Mobile office. He’s since practiced poverty law for more than 45 years. Jaffree is most well-remembered for his 1985 landmark Supreme Court case Wallace v Jaffree. LSA attorneys Ronnie Williams and Jaffree successfully argued that prayer in Alabama public schools was unconstitutional.
Claudia Johnson
Claudia manages LawHelp Interactive, an award-winning document assembly platform and training program at Pro Bono Net. Claudia has been working on access to justice through technology for 15 years, starting at Bay Area Legal Aid in Oakland, California, to design and create the Legal Advice Line. Claudia has been an innovator for 21 years, starting the lawyer of the day project in eviction court in San Francisco and the Language Access Project at CLS, Philadelphia. Claudia helped draft the LEP Court Standards approved by the ABA. Claudia served on the working group that released the Best Practices on E-filing for SRLs published by LSC. Claudia reviews articles for the NCSC Future Trends in State Courts Journal. She is a member of the Washington State ATJ Commission Technology group and guest blogs with Pro Bono Net’s Connecting Justice Communities blog. Her work on online forms was highlighted by the New York Times in 2016. In 2018, Claudia was recognized in the fastcase50. Claudia started her legal career as a Skadden Fellow in Philadelphia. She has three degrees from UC Berkeley and her law degree is from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. She is an immigrant and resides in Eastern Washington and Columbia, Maryland.
Martesha Johnson
Martesha L. Johnson was sworn-in as the Nashville Metropolitan Chief Public Defender on August 28, 2018. She is the first African American to be elected to this position and only the second woman. She has a heart for serving people and was determined to be a public defender after completing an internship with the Nashville Public Defender’s office in 2007. She has devoted her entire career to public defense work and believes people are worth more than the worst thing they have ever done. During her tenure at the public defender’s office, she has served in numerous leadership capacities. She has served as the training director and member of the special litigation unit, primarily focusing on serious felony representation. She has been the team leader in two criminal courts, summer intern coordinator, member of the hiring committee and member of several committees designed to review office policies and make recommendations for improvement.
Martesha currently teaches trial advocacy at Vanderbilt Law School. She is a member of the Nashville Bar Association, the National Association of Public Defenders, the Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Women’s Political Collaborative and the young leaders division of Women for Tennessee’s Future. She is a member of the Harry Phillips American Inn of Court, the National Coalition of 100 Black Women and the Community Corrections Advisory Board. Martesha was nominated and served as a member of the 2016-2017 Nashville Bar Foundation Leadership Forum Class and was recently selected as a member of the 2019 Tennessee Bar Association Leadership Class. She is a graduate of Gideon’s Promise, a program specifically designed to train and develop public defenders. Additionally, Martesha was a member of the inaugural class of Emerge Tennessee, the premier campaign training program for Democratic women, and a nominee for the ATHENA Young Professionals Leadership Award in 2012-2013. She has also taught at Volunteer State community college, coached high school mock trial and participated in numerous community “Know Your Rights” and expungment clinics. She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated. Martesha loves spending time with her 8 year old daughter. They enjoy traveling, reading, and spending time with family and friends. She is a member of the Temple Baptist Church where she sings in the choir.
Twitter: @mlj_615
April Jung
April Jung is a fiscal compliance analyst with the Legal Services Corporation's Office of Compliance and Enforcement. She began her career in forensic services in public accounting, focusing primarily in anti-corruption/anti-bribery-related due diligence and investigations. She is also experienced in working with money-laundering compliance, disputes/litigations, and economic loss claims. She attended the University of Virginia and is a Certified Public Accountant.
Maha Jweied
Maha Jweied is senior fellow with the National Legal Aid & Defender Association. Until January 2018, she served as the acting director of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office for Access to Justice, the primary office in the Executive Branch championing indigent defense and civil legal aid for low-income and vulnerable communities. In that role, she also served as the executive director of the White House Legal Aid Interagency Roundtable and represented the U.S. Government as its indigent defense and legal aid expert in international settings. Before joining the DOJ, she was a senior attorney-advisor at the US Commission on Civil Rights, a litigation associate at Arent Fox, and spent time at Mizan Law Group for Human Rights, a legal aid office in Jordan. She serves on the board of directors of the International Legal Foundation, the board of directors of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, and the advisory board of New Perimeter, a global pro bono program of DLA Piper. She is also a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and a fellow with NYU’s Center for International Cooperation.
Liz Keith
Liz has played a key role in Pro Bono Net’s program strategy for more than a decade. She joined Pro Bono Net as a LawHelp Circuit Rider, working with legal aid programs in 25 states to build online resources to increase access to legal help for low income communities. As Program Director, Liz now manages strategic initiatives and programs at Pro Bono Net that equip individuals and communities with new tools to tackle civil justice problems. Previously, Liz managed outreach and education efforts at the Maine Women’s Policy Center on legislation impacting women’s health, civil rights, economic security and freedom from violence, and worked to increase the number of women running for office. She holds a master's degree in community informatics from the University of Michigan, and has served as a consultant to digital inclusion initiatives in Haiti and Chile. In 2015, she was selected to participate in the inaugural Legal Empowerment Leadership program at Central European University’s School of Public Policy. Liz hails from South Jersey originally and now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Twitter: @elizk
Jon Laramore
Jon Laramore has been executive director of Indiana Legal Services, an LSC-funded program, since March 2015. He began his career as a legal services lawyer, followed by work in state government and private practice, where he concentrated on appellate matters. He also is a member of Indiana’s access to justice commission.
Yvonne Mariajimenez
Yvonne began her career at NLSLA more than 40 years ago. She has a demonstrated background in litigation and policy advocacy in those areas that most impact the poor: housing, Domestic Violence and Family Law, Immigration, public benefits and health.
Mariajimenez was NLSLA’s Deputy Director for more than 20 years, and has played a critical role in all of the organization’s accomplishments. Her enduring commitment to expanding access to health, housing, economic security, and justice has made her a fierce advocate for people living in poverty throughout Los Angeles.
One example of Mariajimenez’s work is NLSLA’s Medical Legal Community Partnerships (MLCP), which use the power of doctors, lawyers and other health professionals to identify and ameliorate the social determinants of health impacting both individual, family and community health status. Mariajimenez’s advocacy work led directly to the County’s adoption of the MLCP model—in close partnership with NLSLA—into its permanent service delivery system.
Mariajimenez earned her B.S. in Business Administration at USC and her J.D. at Loyola Law School, Los Angeles. She is proficient in Spanish.
Sara Mayeux
Sara Mayeux is a legal historian of the 20th Century United States, focusing on criminal law and procedure, constitutional law, and legal culture. She is also interested broadly in the interplay between law and history. Her book, Free Justice: A History of the Public Defender in Twentieth-Century America (UNC Press, 2020), was praised in The Nation magazine as “a definitive history of this important yet conflicted institution,” and received the 2020 Langum Prize in American Legal History. The book chronicles debates about indigent criminal defense from the Progressive Era through the Cold War. In 2017, her Columbia Law Review article on the effects of Gideon v. Wainwright, “What Gideon Did," received the Cromwell Article Prize, awarded annually for the best article in American legal history published by an early career scholar. Professor Mayeux earned her law degree, as well as her Ph.D. in history, from Stanford University. Before joining Vanderbilt’s law faculty in 2016, she was a Sharswood Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and the Berger-Howe Legal History Fellow at Harvard Law School. Before entering the legal academy, she clerked for Judge Marsha S. Berzon of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Twitter: @saramayeux
Devshi Mehrotra
The summer before Devshi Mehrotra’s senior year at the University of Chicago, she read The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. After reading the book, she felt both angry and inspired to think about how she could be a change agent in her community. Five months before graduating with degrees in computer science, she and fellow UChicago College student Leslie Jones-Dove, SB ’19, founded JusticeText, an audiovisual evidence management platform designed to produce fairer criminal justice outcomes by expediting the review of police body camera footage, interrogation videos, jail calls, and more.
Twitter: @DevshiMehrotra
Spring Miller
Spring Miller creates public interest law opportunities for Vanderbilt Law students and facilitates entry into public interest law careers for students and recent graduates. In addition to mentoring and advising students seeking careers in public interest law, she oversees the law school’s pro bono and externship programs. Dean Miller also teaches the Public Lawyer course. A former farmworker legal services attorney, Dean Miller was named assistant dean for public interest in July 2015. Miller received her J.D. magna cum laude from Harvard Law School. She began her legal career as a Skadden Fellow with Southern Migrant Legal Services, a project of Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, and remained with the organization as a staff attorney when the two-year fellowship ended. She later served as the managing attorney for Texas RioGrande Legal Aid’s practice area dedicated to the representation of human trafficking victims.
Twitter: @TALStweet, @vanderbiltlaw
David Miller
David Miller works to promote state and federal policy that expands access to justice for those who cannot afford to pay for legal counsel. He represents civil legal aid and public defender organizations in national conversations and manages NLADA’s advocacy across a range of issues of importance to the equal justice community, including federal funding for the Legal Services Corporation, state and local pretrial reform, and the preservation and implementation of the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program. David is the author of NLADA’s 2018 report PSLF and the Justice System: How Eliminating PSLF Would Harm American Communities.
Prior to joining NLADA in 2013, David worked at LandAid, a foundation in the UK focused on supporting young people who are homeless. David has a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Nottingham and an M.Sc. in Democracy and Comparative Politics from University College London.
Ben Moore
Lillian Moy
Lillian M. Moy has been the Executive Director of the Legal Aid Society of Northeastern New York since 1995. She is a 1974 graduate of Hunter College of the City University of New York and a 1981 graduate of Boston University School of Law. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Albany Medical Center and a past Board member of CARES and the Homeless and Travelers Aid Society. Ms. Moy is a nationally recognized leader, writer and trainer in the civil legal aid community. Her particular areas of expertise are leadership development and diversity. She is past Chair of the Civil Policy Group and the Board of the National Legal Aid and Defender Association. Ms. Moy serves as the Vice President for the Third Judicial District of the New York State Bar Association. She is a member of the New York State Bar Association’s the President’s Committee on Access to Justice and the Committee on Membership. Ms. Moy is also co-convenor of the New York Diversity Coalition, a group of legal services staff and managers dedicated to raising and resolving diversity issues in the legal aid community. She is an Adjunct Professor at the Albany Law School. Ms Moy has been honored by the National Organization of Legal Services Workers, the AlbanyColonie Regional Chamber of Commerce, the Asian American Bar Association of New York, the Schenectady County Bar Association, the New York State Bar Association and the Catholic Charities Housing Office. Most recently, Lillian was the recipient of the New York State Bar Association’s Diversity Trailblazer Award for 2013. Lillian lives in Albany, New York with her daughters, Katie and Maria Moy-Santos
Twitter: @lilkatmar
Georges Naufal
Georges Naufal, Ph.D. is an associate research scientist at the Public Policy Research Institute (PPRI) at Texas A&M University and a research fellow at the IZA Institute of Labor Economics. George is also a visiting scientist at the Center for Outcomes Research at Houston Methodist. Previously, he was the technical director at Timberlake Consultants. He was also an assistant/associate professor of economics at The American University of Sharjah (2007-2014) in the United Arab Emirates. George earned his Ph.D. in Economics in 2007 from Texas A&M University. His area of expertise is applied econometrics with applications to labor economics, including criminal justice and public health.
Twitter: @georgenaufal
Nikole Nelson
Nikole Nelson is the executive director of Alaska Legal Services Corporation (ALSC), Alaska’s only LSC-funded program and the only statewide provider of free civil legal assistance to low-income Alaskans. Nikole oversees ALSC’s 11 offices and a staff of more than 40 people who are scattered across the vast state of Alaska. She joined ALSC in 1998 as a staff attorney shortly after graduating from Willamette University College of Law. Before being hired as ALSC’s Executive Director in 2010, she managed ALSC’s four offices in Alaska’s largest judicial district. She is a member of the Alaska Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Access to Civil Justice, the Alaska Bar Association’s Pro Bono Services Committee, she serves on the Municipality of Anchorage’s Housing and Neighborhood Development Commission, and currently Co-Chair’s that Commission’s Oversight Subcommittee on Homelessness.
Twitter: @NikoleNelson10
Adeola Ogunkeyede
For the past three years, Adeola served as the inaugural director for the Legal Aid Justice Center’s (LAJC) Civil Rights and Racial Justice Program (CRRJ). As designed by Adeola, CRRJ works to reform the criminal legal system’s over-reliance on incarceration and perpetuation of racial inequity through a strategic mix of community organizing, local and statewide policy advocacy, and impact litigation. Resisting lawyer-driven advocacy, Adeola instead opted to let the communities in Charlottesville and Richmond identify their own priorities, which she then vigorously supported. Motivated by her conviction that legal aid has a critical role to play in dismantling racial oppression in the criminal legal system, Adeola patiently worked with her colleagues and members of the Board at LAJC to pursue racial justice as a core, animating feature of LAJC’s work. In just three short years, Adeola established a legacy that has forever changed LAJC and the communities it serves.
Prior to her work in Virginia, Adeola was the director of staff development and litigation supervisor of the criminal practice at The Bronx Defenders, where she began her career as a staff attorney. Throughout her career, Adeola has stood astride the artificial chasm between the civil and defender worlds and made each one better by influencing the other.
Justine Olderman
Justine Olderman graduated magna cum laude and Order of the Coif from New York University School of Law. While at N.Y.U., Justine was the Managing Editor of the Review of Law and Social Change and was awarded the George P. Faulk Memorial Award for Distinguished Scholarship. She spent two years clerking for Judge Robert J. Ward in the Southern District of New York before joining The Bronx Defenders in 2000. After working for a number of years as a staff attorney, Justine became a training team supervisor for new lawyers, then a team leader for experienced practitioners, and then the Managing Attorney of the Criminal Defense Practice. As Managing Attorney, Justine oversaw the expansion of the criminal practice from 40 lawyers handling 12,500 cases a year to a practice of more than 100 lawyers handling 30,000 cases a year. Justine also created an in-house forensic practice group, an adolescent defense practice, and spearheaded a city-wide bail initiative bringing together public defenders across the city to address the problem of bail in New York. In her following role as the Managing Director of the office, Justine oversaw the Criminal, Family, and Civil practices as well as the internal operations of the organization. Justine currently serves as the Executive
Twitter: @JOlderma
Kate Parker
Kate Parker, Esq., currently serves as the Director of Policy-Government and Community Affairs at the Defender Association of Philadelphia, where she engages community partners and lawmakers to bring about systemic change. Before joining the Defender Association of Philadelphia, Ms. Parker served as the policy director for the Delaware Center for Justice, a nonprofit criminal justice advocacy and direct service organization. There she championed legislation to reduce racial disparities in the criminal legal system by targeted measures to improve pretrial decision-making and conditions of youth confinement, limit the circumstances for which youth could be tried as adults, eliminate inequities in drug sentencing structures, and combat the criminalization of non-payment of court fines and fees. Kate previously served as an assistant deputy public defender in New Jersey, where she was assigned to the adult trial team and as an evaluation associate at the University of Delaware’s Center for Community Research and Service, where she used qualitative and quantitative data analysis to make recommendations to improve cultural competence in the statewide children’s mental health delivery system. She graduated from Rutgers’ Camden law school, holds her Masters’ in Urban Affairs and Public Policy from the University of Delaware, and is licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware.
Lisa Pearlstein
Lisa Pearlstein is the director of the City Bar Justice Center’s Legal Clinic for the Homeless. In that capacity, she spearheaded the #WiFi4Homeless campaign, which compelled NYC to install Wi-Fi in more than 260 shelters in New York City in 2021. Ms. Pearlstein trains and mentors volunteer attorneys who represent homeless families on issues such as accessing and challenging denials of public benefits and shelter. Ms. Pearlstein also advocates for system-wide public benefit policy and practice changes that positively affect homeless families. Before her employment at the City Bar Justice Center, Ms. Pearlstein worked for Brooklyn Legal Services Corp as the senior coordinating attorney of the Government Benefits Unit and as a staff attorney in the Group Housing Representation Unit. Ms. Pearlstein is the recipient of the New York City Bar Association’s 2002 Equal Access to Justice Award and Project Fair’s 2007 Equal Access to Justice Award. She is a graduate of Cornell University and Brooklyn Law School.
Jaffee Pickett
Jaffe S. Pickett, Esquire is the Executive Director of Florida Legal Services and is a longtime advocate for issues surrounding the criminalization of poverty and criminal justice restructuring. Pickett has offered testimony to the Department of Justice as well as the Alabama Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and has spoken regionally and nationally on topics surrounding the importance of free civil legal aid. Pickett published “A Guide for Community Redevelopment & Economic Improvement Projects: A Replication Guidebook for Legal Aid & Community Organizations” in 2019 and continues her lifelong passion of advocating for free civil legal aid to impoverished individuals and communities at FRLS.
Twitter: @Frls_Inc
John Pollock
John Pollock is the Coordinator of the National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel and is an attorney at the Public Justice Center. He was the recipient of NLADA's 2018 Innovations in Civil Justice Award. Previously, he was employed as the Enforcement Director at the Central Alabama Fair Housing Center, and before that was a fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center. He graduated from Northeastern University School of Law and from Wesleyan University. In his spare time, he is the founder and coordinator of the Heirs' Property Retention Coalition, which is devoted to protecting the ancestral property of low-income landowners.
Julie Reiskin
Julie Reiskin is the executive director of the Colorado Cross-Disability Coalition (CCDC). In that role, Julie assists other organizations with assuring real and meaningful participation by “clients”at all levels. Through CCDC and the disability community, Julie has gained expertise on nonprofit accountability and best practices, publicly funded long-term community based services, disability rights law, public benefits, and the intersectionality of systemic and individual advocacy. Julie has proposed and helped to implement many solutions to create a sustainable and client friendly Medicaid program, such as the consumer direction as a delivery model, acted as a respected advocate for individuals, and has trained many others in health advocacy and health policy. Prior to becoming the executive director for CCDC in 1996, Julie served as the organization’s policy analyst.
Twitter: @JulieReiskin
Hazel Remesch
Hazel Remesch, Esq., Supervising Attorney at the Legal Aid Society of Cleveland. Hazel has made a name for herself at Legal Aid as a committed advocate for people facing housing crises and is the leading force behind Legal Aid’s Housing Justice Alliance. In 2018, Hazel won a competitive grant from the Sisters of Charity’s Innovation Mission project to fund research on the landscape of evictions in Cleveland. Her ultimate goal was to advocate for a right to counsel in Cleveland eviction cases, based on a law passed by New York City in 2017. After completing her research, Hazel wasted no time putting together a coalition of stakeholders to promote this progressive policy. This group became known as the Housing Justice Alliance (HJA).Her passion stems from what she’s learned during 10 years working in housing law: stable housing is a basic human need that is essential to success and the ability to engage with communities.
Twitter: @HazelRemesch
Stephen Rispoli
Dean Stephen Rispoli earned his political science degree from Baylor University in 2009, his J.D. from Baylor Law in 2012, and his LL.M. from the University of Texas School of Law in 2018. Dean Rispoli serves as Assistant Dean of Student Affairs and Pro Bono Programs and as the Director of Innovation and Scholarship for the school’s Executive LL.M. in Litigation Management.
Prior to attending law school, Dean Rispoli worked as a District Director for former Texas State Representative Carol Kent. His time working in the 81st Legislature fostered his interest in the law and fueled his desire to become a lawyer and a leader. During law school, he was active in student organizations, serving as the Executive President for the Student Bar Association, and Justice for the Phi Alpha Delta Law Fraternity. He interned for Federal Magistrate Judge Jeffrey Manske, learning and applying federal procedure, evidence, and the judicial process.
Andrew Scherer
For many years, Andrew Scherer has played a prominent role in access to justice, housing policy, and other public interest issues, locally, nationally, and internationally. He has been an advocate for the right to counsel in civil matters, particularly eviction proceedings, for over 30 years. He was lead counsel in Donaldson v. State of New York, a class action that sought to establish a right to counsel for low-income tenants facing eviction and led to significant funding for eviction-prevention legal services by New York City. Under Professor Scherer’s direction, the Wilf Impact Center’s Right to Counsel Project works with the NYC Coalition for a Right to Counsel in Housing Court and others advocating for NYC legislation establishing a right to counsel in housing cases. Among his many affiliations, Professor Scherer is an active member of the NYC Bar Association and a former chair of its Executive Committee, an active member of the NYS Bar Association and the current chair of the Civil Gideon subcommittee of the President’s Committee on Access to Justice, a founding member of the National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel, and a former co-chair of the NYS Legal Services Project Director Association. He is also a consultant to nonprofit, governmental, and private clients around matters of access to justice and the rule of law.
Melanie Shakarian
Melanie A. Shakarian, Esq. is Director of Development and Communications with The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland. Legal Aid’s 64 staff attorneys, 44 other staff and nearly 3000 pro bono (volunteer) lawyers provide high-quality free legal assistance to low income clients in Northeast Ohio. Civil legal counsel is proven to foster fairness, empower individuals and eliminate many of the barriers that block families living in poverty from financial stability and greater engagement in their communities. Legal Aid is deeply connected to the needs of the community and has established innovative programs and fostered diverse partnerships to reach its clients.
Melanie manages all philanthropy, public relations, government relations and communications for the nonprofit law firm. Prior to her tenure at Legal Aid, Melanie was Director of Annual Major Gifts and Parish Services for The Catholic Diocese of Cleveland Foundation. In addition to her law degree from Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), she also holds a certificate of nonprofit management from CWRU’s Weatherhead School of Management and the Mandel Center for Nonprofit Organizations.
Twitter: @LegalAidCLE
Margaret Shinn
Margaret Hamlett has been the Community Education & Pro Se Coordinator for Legal Aid Services of Oklahoma since 2004. She develops, writes, and curates content for Legal Aid and the statewide web sites for clients (OKLaw.org) and advocates (ProBono.Net/OK); manages two current TIG Projects and various special technology and court involvement projects. A member of the Oklahoma Bar since 1987, Margaret began private practice in a tax and corporate transaction firm handling tax, business mergers/acquisitions and estate planning matters. Her first pro bono case with Legal Aid in the first year of practice introduced her to Legal Aid's good works. In 2000, Margaret took the opportunity to experience community lawyering, by working with the homeless, people with serious mental illnesses and their families and women reintegrating from prison.
Jared Smith
Jared Smith is MIE’s Resource Development Support Services Consultant, tasked with enhancing the sharing of best practices, resources, and trainings in private fundraising and state and local legislative fundraising efforts; expanding the accessibility of the ABA Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defense’s online ABArray Legal Aid Funding Data Report; and engaging legal aid leaders in MIE’s resource development support activities. In addition to this consultant role, Jared also serves as the Foundation and Development Manager of the North Carolina Equal Access to Justice Commission. In the past, he served as the Communications Coordinator for the National Association of Pro Bono Professionals and as an adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina School of Law. He is a graduate of Carolina Law and of Davidson College, and is a licensed attorney in North Carolina.
Twitter: @MIELegalAid
Email: [email protected]
Lisa Smith
Lisa C. Smith is chief counsel for family and gender violence at the New York State Office of Court Administration, Office of Policy and Planning. Ms. Smith is responsible for legal, policy, training, and operational issues in gender and family violence courts throughout NYS. She was formerly the executive assistant for domestic violence and child abuse in the Office of the Kings County District Attorney. Lisa was also a professor at Brooklyn Law School, where she was the director of Criminal and Judicial Externships and the Prosecutors Clinic, in which she supervised students prosecuting cases, often in the domestic violence parts in the court system. Most recently, Ms. Smith was in private practice in the areas of Title IX and sexual harassment on college campuses, working with numerous high schools and colleges on campus safety issues. Lisa currently serves as a liaison to the American Bar Association Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence.
Julianne Tarver
Julianne is a Maryland attorney with experience representing Maryland's most vulnerable populations and mentoring attorneys from the private bar for civil matters. She is passionate about community involvement and sits on community-oriented nonprofit boards.
Julianne earned her J.D. from the University of Baltimore School of Law.
Jaundalynn Taylor
Juandalynn Taylor, Ph.D., J.D. is a seasoned Independent Mitigation Specialist, Continuing Legal Education Faculty Member, and Social Scientist. She has 15 years of experience working with defendants as a mitigation specialist in multiple jurisdictions on various state, federal, juvenile, and post-conviction cases. Having participated in over two hundred cases.
Dr. Taylor is a veteran at providing defense teams with detailed investigations, well-reasoned analysis, empathy-evoking evidence, extensive record collection, assistance with identifying experts and witnesses, reports, exhibits, pre-trial mitigation packets, and consultations Prior to working as a full-time mitigation specialist, Dr. Taylor enjoyed a 12-year career as a university professor. She taught courses in Rhetorical Studies, Interpersonal Communication, Persuasion, Legal Issues in Communication, Advocacy, Political Communication & Cultural Studies.
Cesar Torres
César Torres has been the executive director of the Northwest Justice Project, a statewide, publicly funded legal aid program serving low-income communities throughout Washington State, since 2006. Previously, he served as deputy director of Essex Newark Legal Services in Newark, New Jersey (1998-2006), and was the managing attorney for that program’s Housing & Income Maintenance Unit (1989-2006). Beginning in 2003, he litigated and supervised a Predatory Lending Practices Project. He began his legal services career immediately after law school as a staff attorney at Hudson County Legal Services. During law school, he clerked for the Legal Aid Society (civil) in New York and completed an externship at the Center for Law and Social Policy in Washington, D.C. César’s advocacy efforts in Essex County, New Jersey, combined litigation with community struggles to limit the loss of federally assisted and affordable private housing, address the Hope VI and Mark-to-Market housing programs, and include significant state appellate advocacy experience. César earned his J.D. at the University of Virginia School of Law and his B.A. from Yale University. He is currently chair of the MIE board of directors.
Rick Vestal
Jo-Ann Wallace
Jo-Ann was the organization’s senior vice president for programs, responsible for oversight of both the civil legal aid and public defense program agendas. From 1994 to 2000, she served as director of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, widely regarded as the nation’s model defender agency. She is a founder of the American Council of Chief Defenders, a leadership council of the top defender executives from across the United States, and the District of Columbia Appellate Practice Institute. Her extensive experience lecturing includes serving as a member of the visiting faculty for the Trial Advocacy Workshop at Harvard Law School. Jo-Ann received recognition from the White House as a “Champion of Change.” She is a graduate of New York University School of Law.
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