Liberian children find help in US Bar Association effort
Saturday, March 18, 2006
- Organization: Providence RI Business News
The 32 children came from refugee camps in civil war-torn Liberia, helped by the United Nations to find a safe haven with friends and relatives in Rhode Island. The war is over now, but to protect the children, local lawyers are helping their guardians secure their legal status.
In a collaboration between the International Institute of Rhode Island, a nonprofit agency that provides educational, legal and social services to immigrants and refugees, and the Rhode Island Bar Association, Liberian children's guardians are getting free legal counsel to pursue guardianship of the youngsters in local probate courts.
To recruit lawyers for the pro bono project, the Bar Association held a special training seminar in December to explain how to handle the guardianship cases. Since then, three lawyers have been assigned cases, and about 40 others are waiting to be paired up.
Bar Association President Philip M. Weinstein agreed to represent three refugee children - Mario, Malaica and Gladys Gaye - and their grandmother in the first guardianship cases to make it to court, in Pawtucket.
"If you haven't been to some of these countries, you have no idea," said Weinstein, who has toured Ethiopia and Djibouti for vacation and on medical missions. "Everyone you talk to in those countries has a family member who was killed."
The Gaye children's mother died in an accident, Weinstein said, and he's been told their father is in a refugee camp in Ghana.
Making their grandmother their legal guardian will enable the children to receive medical care and welfare benefits and make registration for other services easier, said Terri Coustan, program coordinator for the refugee resettlement and assistance program at the International Institute.
"[The United States is] a world of formality," she said. "A lot of times the only piece of documentation these refugees have is a notarized letter I can produce."
Though pro bono work is a long-standing tradition among lawyers and firms, some firms have taken a heightened interest in the subject in recent years.
Nixon Peabody, for example, hired a partner, Stacey Slater, based in New York, to oversee and promote pro bono work throughout the national firm. Though the firm has encouraged pro bono work in the past, Slater said, this newly structured position was meant to send a strong message about the importance of pro bono work in hopes of increasing participation among the firm's attorneys.
"We have an ethical obligation to give back," Slater said.
About half of the firm's 15 Providence lawyers handled a pro bono case last year, said Andrew Prescott, labor attorney and coordinator of the Providence office's pro bono program.
Pro bono cases also are good training opportunities for new lawyers, Slater said, and they can lead to greater job satisfaction.
It can also be good for business.
"We see an increasing trend in which large corporate clients ask law firms how much pro bono they do," said Albert Wallis, executive director of the Brown Rudnick Center for the Public Interest, a center founded by Brown, Rudnick, Berlack, Israels about five years ago to champion pro bono work in the firm, which has offices in Providence.
About 1,200 of Rhode Island's 5,500 attorneys are active members in the Bar Association's Volunteer Lawyer Program, which helps train and link attorneys to pro bono opportunities in the state, according to program coordinator Sue Fontaine.
"There are lots of benefits," Wallis said. "The most direct and clearest one is improving and keeping the judicial system of law working, knowing you're part of enhancing your profession and helping your nation."
In a collaboration between the International Institute of Rhode Island, a nonprofit agency that provides educational, legal and social services to immigrants and refugees, and the Rhode Island Bar Association, Liberian children's guardians are getting free legal counsel to pursue guardianship of the youngsters in local probate courts.
To recruit lawyers for the pro bono project, the Bar Association held a special training seminar in December to explain how to handle the guardianship cases. Since then, three lawyers have been assigned cases, and about 40 others are waiting to be paired up.
Bar Association President Philip M. Weinstein agreed to represent three refugee children - Mario, Malaica and Gladys Gaye - and their grandmother in the first guardianship cases to make it to court, in Pawtucket.
"If you haven't been to some of these countries, you have no idea," said Weinstein, who has toured Ethiopia and Djibouti for vacation and on medical missions. "Everyone you talk to in those countries has a family member who was killed."
The Gaye children's mother died in an accident, Weinstein said, and he's been told their father is in a refugee camp in Ghana.
Making their grandmother their legal guardian will enable the children to receive medical care and welfare benefits and make registration for other services easier, said Terri Coustan, program coordinator for the refugee resettlement and assistance program at the International Institute.
"[The United States is] a world of formality," she said. "A lot of times the only piece of documentation these refugees have is a notarized letter I can produce."
Though pro bono work is a long-standing tradition among lawyers and firms, some firms have taken a heightened interest in the subject in recent years.
Nixon Peabody, for example, hired a partner, Stacey Slater, based in New York, to oversee and promote pro bono work throughout the national firm. Though the firm has encouraged pro bono work in the past, Slater said, this newly structured position was meant to send a strong message about the importance of pro bono work in hopes of increasing participation among the firm's attorneys.
"We have an ethical obligation to give back," Slater said.
About half of the firm's 15 Providence lawyers handled a pro bono case last year, said Andrew Prescott, labor attorney and coordinator of the Providence office's pro bono program.
Pro bono cases also are good training opportunities for new lawyers, Slater said, and they can lead to greater job satisfaction.
It can also be good for business.
"We see an increasing trend in which large corporate clients ask law firms how much pro bono they do," said Albert Wallis, executive director of the Brown Rudnick Center for the Public Interest, a center founded by Brown, Rudnick, Berlack, Israels about five years ago to champion pro bono work in the firm, which has offices in Providence.
About 1,200 of Rhode Island's 5,500 attorneys are active members in the Bar Association's Volunteer Lawyer Program, which helps train and link attorneys to pro bono opportunities in the state, according to program coordinator Sue Fontaine.
"There are lots of benefits," Wallis said. "The most direct and clearest one is improving and keeping the judicial system of law working, knowing you're part of enhancing your profession and helping your nation."
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