Category: Pro Bono Partnerships

Global CSR + Pro Bono

One of the ways to increase pro bono activities within in-house legal departments is to closely align them with the company’s ethos and its global corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts. One such example of the complementary nature of Global CSR and pro bono programs is the work done by International Business Machines Corporation (IBM), which have garnered numerous awards and recognition for the company. IBM’s legal department’s pro bono activities routinely match with the company’s CSR initiatives through such programs as IBM’s employee Corporate Service Corps and On Demand Community. In 2011, IBM celebrated its 100-year anniversary by encouraging employees

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Partnership Develops Tools to Aid Judges in South Asia

South Asia has suffered from a significant amount of terrorist violence over the years. For example, 38 percent of terrorist incidents in 2013 occurred in South Asia, according to the Global Center on Cooperative Security. In 2014, according to the U.S. State Department, more than 60 percent of terrorist attacks took place in just five countries (Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, and Nigeria), of which three are in South Asia; nearly 6,700 people died from terrorist attacks in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and India that year. In recognition of the need to build expertise in the adjudication of terrorism-related cases, the Global Center

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Mobilizing Pro Bono

In the spring of 2013, two weeks after attending an immigration law training session hosted by Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld*†, AT&T Inc.** volunteers put their skills to use by participating in a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival mega-clinic. At the clinic, set in a local Dallas high school that serves a large immigrant population, AT&T attorneys counseled more than 250 immigrants regarding eligibility and in filling out detailed applications. The clinic was designed as a one-day project; however, one client who needed more assistance stuck out to Belinda Marin Boling, a co-chair of AT&T’s southwest region’s pro bono

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Liberia, the Magna Carta, and the Rule of Law

On June 15, thousands of people from around the world descended on a field in Runnymede in the United Kingdom to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the sealing of the Magna Carta. Although the Magna Carta was not the first time a monarch agreed to respect the rights and liberties of others, it went on to become an icon for the revolutionary concepts of due process and the rule of law. As British Prime Minister David Cameron noted at the commemoration, “Think of South Africa – of that courtroom in Rivonia. As Nelson Mandela stood in the dock, looking at

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A Mighty Few Seek to Protect Native American Art

While only a small group, volunteers from the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Northwest Justice Project, and Foster Pepper are aiming to have a big impact on a serious problem for Native American and Alaska Native artisans: counterfeiters. Many Native American and Alaska native artists, whose income relies on creating and selling traditional arts and crafts, are unable to compete with counterfeiters who saturate the market with mass produced knock-offs. Beginning in 2010, the lean team of four attorneys and eight non-lawyers (including the AFSC volunteer committee) has attacked this issue using multiple legal and non-legal avenues by educating Native artisans

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In Western-MA, MassMutual Leads

Headquartered in Springfield, Mass., and having a large satellite office in nearby Enfield, Conn., with a combined legal department composed of 56 attorneys and 80 non-lawyers, Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company** (MassMutual) has the distinction of employing more lawyers than any other company or law firm in the greater Springfield area. As a result, when the legal department started to formalize its pro bono efforts in 2007, it did not have the option of working with a larger legal department or large firm with an existing pro bono program. Instead, MassMutual developed its own distinctive pro bono effort. Over the

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Television and Pro Bono: An Innovative Approach

How does one of the world’s premier entertainment brands engage its lawyers in pro bono?  It does what comes naturally and combines the medium of television with the unique skills of its legal department and production staff to make a difference to those in need around the globe. In 2006, Kenya adopted the Sexual Offences Act, designed to combat gender-based violence. For several years after its passage, implementation of the law proved difficult as the new rights and obligations were not well-understood.  To increase public awareness of gender-based violence and the implications of the new law, the legal department of Viacom International Media

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Sikorsky Committed to Helping Veterans

The PBEye is proud to highlight one legal department’s efforts to assist veterans on a pro bono basis. The Connecticut Veterans Legal Center (CVLC), a nonprofit that helps veterans overcome legal barriers, was just four-months old with only one full-time staff member when it was approached by the Sikorsky Aircraft, Corp. In the years since, Sikorsky’s legal department has built a pro bono project that dedicates staff and resources to achieve a number of positive outcomes for veterans in Connecticut. Sikorsky, while small in staff, has worked with CVLC to provide pro bono representation in more than 20 cases to

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New Legislation Brings New Opportunity

As Target Corporation**, Lindquist & Vennum*, and the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota (ILCM) demonstrate, with new legislation comes new opportunities to serve those in desperate need of legal assistance. In June 2012, the Obama Administration issued a directive implemented by the Department of Homeland Security which provides eligible immigrants the opportunity to defer deportation action and seek work authorization through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.  In Minnesota, a team of lawyers from Target, Lindquist, and ILCM, worked together to develop a pro bono project to help these young immigrants realize their rights under this new directive.

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Bridging Distance to Serve Pro Se Litigants and the Courts

When the Colorado Supreme Court’s Commission on the Legal Profession asked CenturyLink, Inc. and Bryan Cave*† in August 2012 to provide pro bono assistance to pro se clients in the Seventeenth Judicial District, they eagerly jumped to the challenge. Together, CenturyLink and Bryan Cave developed and now staff the Adam’s County Self Help Resource Center Support Initiative, an innovative pro bono effort that overcomes the issue of connecting pro se litigants that are located far from volunteers. The result has helped not only thousands of individual pro se litigants in a few months, but the entire local court system. The

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