Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll

I was recently among 17 attorneys from my law firm submitted for high honors from the Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll. This list recognizes attorneys who contributed more than 100 hours of free legal work to low-income individuals in 2019. I also became a member of the Texas Pro Bono College related to the same service.

My main pro bono projects include:

The Project for Transgender Incarcerated Survivors: I brought this project to the firm as part of our LGBT Affinity Group. PTIS works with incarcerated transgender and gender non-conforming (TGNC) individuals who are denied human rights while housed in prisons and jails.

FIU AMICUS: This is a project with Florida International University’s Death Penalty Clinic. We research and monitor death penalty cases in Miami-Dade County. One of the odd things about this particular project is that many of the cases involve neighborhoods that I am very familiar with from high school and college.

DC LGBT Bar’s Criminal Justice Reform Project: I became involved with this effort as a board member of the LGBT Bar Association of the District of Columbia. I help a team of local lawyers that review recommendations from the D.C. Criminal Code Reform Commission for possible impacts on the LGBT Community.

Although pro bono service is required to maintain bar licenses in many jurisdictions, I am lucky that my firm also counts this work toward our billable hours requirements. So far, most of my pro bono work involves LGBT rights and criminal justice reform, which is a far cry from my everyday tax work. I enjoy the variety, although I’m also grateful that my main job doesn’t involve the live-or-death consequences. 🕺