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Rosalyn Garbose Nasdor, Ropes & Gray's Senior Pro Bono Manager (center), Byrne Harrison, Pro Bono Coordinator, and Kathy Falkenstrom, Pro Bono Assistant, administer the firm's pro bono program. |
Ropes & Gray’s commitment to pro bono work is facilitated by an active Pro Bono Committee, chaired by partners Bill Sussman and Jeff Katz, which identifies and considers prospective initiatives, and by a Pro Bono Manager and her staff who administer and foster the firm’s pro bono program. In 2009 and 2010, the attorneys, summer associates, paralegals, and staff of Ropes & Gray dedicated over 170,000 hours to pro bono clients, ranging from transactional work for nonprofits to cases for individuals referred to us by nonprofit legal service providers.
Ropes & Gray encourages our lawyers and staff to engage in pro bono work. We do not distinguish between pro bono clients and paying clients in terms of the quality of legal services provided or for purposes of associate reviews and compensation. By giving our associates as much credit for time spent on pro bono matters as for time spent representing the firm’s paying clients, we ensure our pro bono clients receive the same high level of service that is Ropes & Gray’s hallmark.
Ropes & Gray's pro bono activities are too extensive to address comprehensively on this website. The examples below provide a flavor of the depth and breadth of the firm's pro bono program. To learn more about the firm’s pro bono work, please take a look at our most recent Pro Bono Annual Report.
Asylum and Immigration
Ropes & Gray has long been a leading provider of pro bono representation to those fleeing repression based on political or religious beliefs, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, and safeguarding rights of immigrants. In 2010 alone, Ropes & Gray assisted over 130 asylum seekers and refugees.
Political Asylum/Immigration Representation (PAIR)
For more than 15 years, Ropes & Gray attorneys have represented indigent PAIR clients seeking political asylum in the United States. The firm and its lawyers have received several awards from PAIR in recognition of the significant contribution to its goal of providing legal representation to those fleeing persecution. Jenny Rikoski is the most recent Ropes & Gray associate to be honored with PAIR's 2010 Outstanding Service Award for her work with Iraqi asylum seekers. In addition, a team of associates was selected for the 2008 PAIR Mentor Award for its exceptional work as mentors for the Ropes & Gray attorneys representing PAIR clients, and the firm received the 2007 PAIR Pro Bono Outstanding Service Award.
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Gina
Gebhart (Washington University School of Law '05), Hannah Bornstein (Indiana University School of Law, Bloomington '07) Maria Carboni and Jenny Rikoski (Georgetown University Law Center '06) are leaders in the firm's PAIR program.
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Immigration Equality
Immigration Equality is a national organization fighting for equal immigration rights for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and HIV-positive (LGBT/H) community. In 2010, the firm secured asylum for 7 clients in the LGBT/H community. In recognition of our exemplary work on behalf of Immigration Equality's clients, the firm received an Immigration Equality Safe Haven Award in 2010 and another in 2011, making ours the only firm to be honored two years in a row.
Human Rights First (HRF)
The firm also represents asylum-seekers referred by HRF, an international human rights organization. In 2010, we assisted a victim of domestic abuse whose recently deceased husband had never completed the process that would have allowed her to become a legal permanent resident. At risk of losing both her public housing and her right to remain in the United States, her pro bono attorneys helped her apply for and receive permanent residency based on her status as a battered or abused spouse and a resident widow of a U.S. citizen.
Health Care
Medical Legal Partnership | Boston
Ropes & Gray is one of the first firms to participate in the "Adopt a Health Center" program sponsored by Medical Legal Partnership | Boston (MLP). This innovative program promotes health through preventive legal services in community-based health and social services centers. The primary goal of the program is to help low-income families address non-biologic factors (e.g., food, education, housing) known to influence child health.
Ropes & Gray staffs a weekly legal clinic at "Dot House," located in the Dorchester section of Boston, and provides ongoing representation for patients referred to the legal clinic by the center's medical staff. By assisting needy families and children with housing, immigration, public benefits, education, and family law issues, we strengthen families and help level the playing field for needy children.
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Ropes & Gray's in-house MLP | Boston team was awarded the Pro Bono Innovator Award at the organization's 2010 annual event. Several team members are featured here with Dot House partner-clinicians. |
LegalHealth Clinic
Ropes & Gray attorneys joined our client, Pfizer, and three other law firms to work together with LegalHealth to assist low-income individuals by providing legal assistance in the form of advance directives, including medical powers of attorney, health care proxies and simple wills, as well as guardianship proceedings. Together we staff a monthly legal directives/guardianship clinic at the NYU Cancer Institute.
Housing and Homelessness
Ropes & Gray has made the preservation of housing and enforcement of basic housing standards a focus of its pro bono program. Lawyers across our offices have represented low-income tenants in eviction proceedings, and have filed suits to challenge appalling housing conditions, including lack of heat, bug and rodent infestation, mold, and other potential harmful conditions. In addition, we have assisted those without homes in applying for benefits that can help them regain their footing.
Among our recent clients were an elderly couple facing eviction after their landlord asserted that the tenant of record was no longer living in the apartment. Ropes & Gray attorneys assisted this couple by asserting succession rights, thereby allowing them to stay in the rent-controlled apartment. We also assisted a mentally ill homeless man who had been denied Social Security benefits despite his medical issues, by successfully appealing the denial of benefits.
Small Business
Samasource
Ropes & Gray attorneys have provided general corporate representation to Samasource that has assisted it in increasing the reach and viability of its mission, bringing dignified, computer-based work to women, youth and refugees living in poverty. Samasource selects locally-owned small businesses, nonprofits, and groups of home-based workers from the poorest parts of the world to act as service partners; provides the service partners with free computer training; and connects them to paying clients through a team based in San Francisco. The result is that marginalized people, from refugees in Kenya to women in Pakistan, are able to receive life-changing work opportunities via the Internet.
Economic Justice Project
In 2010, we expanded our participation in the Belin Economic Justice Project, providing legal services for entrepreneurs in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood. In collaboration with Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights, our attorneys host free basic business law workshops and answer Chinese business owners’ questions during legal clinics. Over forty entrepreneurs and small business owners attended the first workshop, with many receiving one-on-one assistance at the follow-up clinic. In providing an overview of a number of important business legal topics, the workshops and clinics build the understanding that entrepreneurs and small business owners need to improve performance while protecting themselves, their businesses, and their personal assets.
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Associate Gray Stephens lead the firm's Economic Justice Project team. |
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Associate Keith Baumann (center) assists Mindy Fong, owner of Jade Chocolates (right).
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Nonprofit Assistance
Ropes & Gray regularly represents nonprofit organizations in a variety of pro bono matters, including gaining tax-exempt status, acquiring property, defending against lawsuits, and protecting their intellectual property. The following are some highlights of what we have accomplished for these worthwhile organizations.
Carter Burden Center for the Aging
The Carter Burden Center serves senior citizens, providing a diverse set of programs including a luncheon club, exercise classes, computer training, arts classes, and cultural programs. The Carter Burden Center sought our assistance with devising a trademark strategy to protect the brands of several existing and new programs at the Center while also ensuring that the Center was not infringing any marks of other organizations. Our advice allowed the Center to expand its programs and advertise those programs with greater legal security.
World Institute on Disability
Our attorneys have advised the World Institute on Disability (WID), a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting independence and societal inclusion of people with disabilities, in negotiating and structuring its arrangements with business partners. We are helping WID create a memorandum of understanding setting forth the relative rights and responsibilities of WID and its two primary business partners as they develop an online benefits calculator and database.
LIFT
LIFT provides comprehensive services to low-income individuals, first helping them address immediate needs (such as employment, shelter, health care, basic necessities like clothing and food, or education), then providing long-term support designed to help families break the cycle of poverty. Since its inception ten years ago, LIFT has helped more than 30,000 families and individuals across the country pull away from poverty and homelessness. We assisted LIFT in adopting best practices corporate governance policies, such as a new conflict of interest policy and a code of ethics. We continue to advise the organization on general corporate matters such as personnel matters, leases and other contracts.
Nonprofit Incorporation and Tax Matters
The firm’s corporate and tax attorneys have helped many nonprofit
groups form legal entities and address associated tax matters. These include:
D.C. Open Government Coalition
The D.C. Open Government Coalition’s goal is to educate the public and government officials about the District’s open government laws while auditing the government’s ability to identify problem areas. In 2010, our attorneys helped the Coalition incorporate and gain tax-exempt status. By helping to ensure fiscal accountability, we have positioned the organization to attract the funding needed to solidify its role as D.C.’s government watchdog.
Urban Kitchen
The San Francisco-based Urban Kitchen Workshops (UKW) aims to promote sustainable cooking and eating through hands-on classes and seminars. With the assistance of our attorneys, UKW filed for incorporation and was granted tax-exempt status.
Clinics
Massachusetts Legal Clinic for the Homeless (MLCH)
Under the auspices of the Lawyers Clearinghouse on Affordable Housing
and Homelessness, a team of Ropes & Gray lawyers and paralegals conducts
half-day legal clinics for the disadvantaged twice a year at area homeless shelters.
At these clinics, our lawyers meet with indigent individuals to select those
matters in which we can be of assistance. We have represented many homeless people
on a variety of matters, including obtaining Social Security benefits, obtaining
public housing assistance, appealing evictions, negotiating criminal surrenders,
and settling disputes with creditors, taxing authorities, employers, and landlords.
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Partner Jeff
Katz and Sarah Clinton (Boston University School of Law '05) not only represent
MLCH clients but they also manage the program. Sarah won a pro bono award from the Lawyers Clearinghouse for her exemplary work and commitment to MLCH.
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Suffolk Probate Court — Lawyer for the Day Program
Our lawyers serve as the "Lawyer for the Day" at the Suffolk County Probate and Family Court and provide indigent individuals with legal advice concerning any matter before the court. The matters range from child custody, to paternity testing and divorce, to guardianships, probating wills, and more traditional probate matters.
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Kevin Willis (Suffolk University Law School '96) oversees
the Suffolk Probate Court program and provides training to
participants. Kevin is the 2008 winner of the firm's Deborah Levi Award for Outstanding Pro Bono Service. |
Boston Housing Court — Attorney for a Day Program and the Trial Attorney Project
Attorneys serve as the "Attorney for a Day" in Boston Housing Court providing legal advice to pro se indigent parties with matters before the court. Lawyers have advised on eviction proceedings and claims for compensation for uninhabitable dwellings.
Through the Trial Attorney Project our lawyers also provide pro se parties with the benefits of having counsel inside the courtroom as well. The volunteer attorneys provide representation at jury-waived or jury summary process trials. Ropes & Gray piloted the program that has since grown to include other Boston law firms. In recognition of our work, Ropes & Gray was awarded the Dennis Maguire Pro Bono Award from the Volunteer Lawyers Project in 2008.
NYC Family Court Self-Represented Legal Services Project
Attorneys in the New York office participate in the NYC Family Court Self-Represented Legal Services Project. This Brooklyn, Bronx and Manhattan-based project is a first-of-its-kind pro bono project where pro bono attorneys provide advice and counsel during 30-minute one-on-one sessions with pro se litigants who come to Family Court on matters involving child support, visitation, custody, guardianship, and paternity. This project has been extremely well received by the clients who have been served. It also affords pro bono attorneys an excellent opportunity to make a big impact without a significant time commitment.
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Pro Bono Committee co-chair Bill Sussman supervises the NYC Family Court Legal Services Project. Madeleine Kane (Georgetown University Law Center '07) has been an active participant since the project's inception in January 2008. |
Death Penalty Cases
Ropes & Gray has two pending death penalty cases. By helping these clients utilize the various avenues of relief available to them to appeal and, if successful, undo their death sentences, Ropes & Gray joins other firms that seek to ensure that those on death row have received adequate representation.
One of our clients Christopher Lee Price was sentenced to death in Alabama state court in 1993 for a crime that he committed when he was 19 years old. Price's trial counsel failed to conduct an adequate investigation into his personal background and thus failed to learn that Price had been physically, mentally, and sexually abused by various family members from childhood though adolescence. As a result, his trial counsel presented virtually no mitigation evidence during the penalty phase of the trial. Other serious errors by the prosecution and the trial court also rendered the penalty phase fundamentally unfair. Ropes & Gray has been seeking to have Price's death sentence vacated for nearly 10 years. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in late 2009 that Price's federal petition for habeas corpus presents several constitutional claims that warrant appellate review. In January 2011, Price’s case was submitted to the 11th Circuit following a 60-minute oral argument before Judges Tjoflat, Barkett, and Wilson. We are awaiting a decision from the panel.
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Partner Steve Braga and Aaron Katz (Harvard
Law School '04) are currently working on the firm's death
penalty cases. |
The District Attorney’s Office Assistant DA Program
Ropes & Gray sends a litigation associate to Middlesex County and
to Kings County every six months, for a six-month term, to work as a
full-time assistant district attorney.
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Kate Isley recently returned from a six-month stint at the Middlesex District Attorney's Office.
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Walk to the Hill
The Boston Bar Association and the Massachusetts Bar Association again sponsored the "Walk to the Hill for Legal Aid." The goal of the Walk is to bring hundreds of private attorneys to Beacon Hill to talk to their legislators about the importance of increasing funding for civil legal aid programs.
A group of 42 Ropes & Gray attorneys, including our Managing Partner, participated in the Walk in 2011, taking the award for best turnout by a law firm. The lobbying effort couldn’t come at a more critical time. The Massachusetts Legal Aid Corporation (MLAC) has cut grants to legal aid programs by 55 percent since 2008, and the number of legal aid attorneys at MLAC-funded programs has fallen 21 percent. Meanwhile, those eligible for legal aid have grown by 91,000 between 2007 and 2009.
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To raise awareness of the importance of increasing funding for civil legal aid programs, Ropes & Gray attorneys participated in the 12th Annual Walk to the Hill for Legal Aid on February 22, 2011. |
Honors and Awards
Each year the firm awards the Deborah Levi Award for Outstanding Pro Bono Service to one or more lawyers for their outstanding pro bono efforts on behalf of the firm. The award was named in honor of Ropes & Gray attorney Deb Levi, who lost her courageous battle with cancer in 2002. Among her many contributions to Ropes & Gray, Deb worked tirelessly and devotedly on pro bono and public service projects large and small.
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2010 Deborah Levi Award recipient, Ann Lewis, who was honored for her exemplary work on behalf of pro bono clients seeking asylum to escape persecution because of their sexual orientation.
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In 2010 Ropes & Gray presented its annual Ropes & Gray Award for Outstanding Partner Pro Bono Service to Boston-based partner Michele Garvin for her work building a Medical-Legal Partnership at Dorchester House and establishing a national law firm model for promoting health through preventative legal services in community-based health centers.
Ropes & Gray’s dedication to pro bono work has also been recognized by our pro bono partners.
In 2010, Ropes & Gray attorneys were honored for their outstanding pro bono work in the following ways; the Boston Business Journal ranked Ropes & Gray first in its survey of area firms based on their 2009 Massachusetts pro bono hours; the Medical-Legal Partnership | Boston presented its Pro Bono Innovator Award to Ropes & Gray; Immigration Equality presented the firm with its Safe Haven Award; the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law of the Boston Bar honored an associate for his leadership role in the Economic Justice Project; the Political Asylum/Immigration Representation Project presented its Outstanding Achievement Award to a Boston-based tax associate for her work representing Iraqi clients; two associates were recognized for their work on behalf of Legal Services NYC; five associates received Pro Bono Publico Awards from The Legal Aid Society for their work as legal fellows; the New York State Bar Association named several associates as Empire State Counsel for their work performing 50+ hours of pro bono work for low-income New Yorkers; Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly honored a Boston-based health care partner with its Rx for Excellence Award for her Medical-Legal Partnership work; and a Boston-based corporate associate was named to the Boston Bar Association’s Public Interest Leadership Program.
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Boston associate Darren Braham and Boston partner Michele Garvin were honored for their pro bono work in 2010. Braham was recognized by The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law of the Boston Bar for his work on the Economic Justice Project. Garvin was honored by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly for her work on the Medical-Legal Partnership.
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In the previous year, Ropes & Gray attorneys received the following honors: ten associates were named to the Volunteer Lawyers Project Honor Roll for their civil legal assistance to low-income residents of Boston; a partner received the Boston University School of Law's inaugural Public Service Award; Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law of the Boston Bar honored an associate for his work in civil rights and housing matters; the Political Asylum/Immigration Representation Project presented a partner with their 2009 Outstanding Service Award; an associate was honored by the Massachusetts Legal Clinic for the Homeless for her work coordinating the firm's efforts on their behalf; the Legal Aid Society awarded its 2009 Pro Bono Publico Award to one of our partners for his service to the Society and its clients; the New York City Family Court Volunteer Lawyer Program recognized twenty-six associates who participated in its family court clinic; the Boston Bar Association and the Equal Justice Coalition recognized the firm and Pro Bono Assistant Kathy Falkenstrom for our efforts with the 2009 Walk to the Hill.
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