Photo courtesy of
Lincoln Harris.

2007

Naznin Saifi (Alumnus/a Working in the US): Naznin Saifi is the managing attorney for the Prince William Branch of Legal Services of Northern Virginia (LSNV).  Ms. Saifi is a member of the Prince William Bar Association and serves on the Pro Bono and Family Law committees.  She is Vice Chair of the Prince William Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Committee and a conciliator for the Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court.  During her tenure as managing attorney, Ms. Saifi has expanded LSNV’s uncontested divorce clinic in Prince William County and is currently working with other members of the bar to develop a simple wills project.  Ms. Saifi also conducts regular community legal education seminars at the local homeless shelter. Prior to LSNV, Ms. Saifi served at the Legal Aid Society of Mercer County in Trenton, New Jersey and the Spokane Legal Services Center in Spokane, Washington.  While at Legal Aid in Trenton, Ms. Saifi distinguished herself in the area of public benefits law, conducting statewide training of new advocates in the area of Work First New Jersey, as well as a variety of continuing legal education seminars focusing on welfare and public benefits housing law.  Active in the state bar, Ms. Saifi was selected to serve on the Long Term Planning and Pro Bono committees for the state bar, and was Chair of the Minorities in the Profession section.  Ms. Saifi was also appointed as the state bar representative for the New Jersey Supreme Court Task Force on Minority Concerns.   

Layli Miller-Muro (Alumnus/a Working Outside the US): Layli Miller-Muro is the Executive Director of the Tahirih Justice Center, a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting women from human rights abuses through the provision of legal aid and public policy advocacy.  Ms. Miller-Muro founded the organization in 1997 following her involvement in a high-profile case that set national precedent and revolutionized asylum law in the United States. In that case, a 17-year-old girl who had fled Togo in fear of a forced polygamous marriage and a tribal practice known as female genital mutilation, was granted asylum in 1996 by the US Board of Immigration Appeals. This decision opened the door to gender-based persecution as grounds for asylum. Prior to founding Tahirih as Executive Director in 2001, Ms. Miller-Muro was an attorney at Arnold & Porter where she practiced international litigation and maintained a substantial pro bono practice. Prior to joining Arnold & Porter, Ms. Miller-Muro was an attorney-advisor at the U.S. Department of Justice, Board of Immigration Appeals.

Lauren Bartlett (WCL Student): A third year law student at WCL, Lauren Bartlett has spent much of her law school career dedicated to providing assistance and supporting communities affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.  She is a leader of the Student Hurricane Network (SHN), a national association of law students.  Ms. Bartlett began fundraising and organizing for Gulf Coast communities in fall 2005.  She helped organize the 2006 WCL Alternative Spring Break trip to New Orleans and Mississippi.  In fall 2006, Ms. Bartlett participated in the Matchmakers for Justice program through SHN, in which she acted as an advocate on behalf of a displaced resident for 6 weeks.  This spring, she coordinated over 1,000 law student volunteer trips to the Gulf Coast, including 39 students from WCL.  She coordinated a survey project over spring break 2007 where 150 law students interviewed over 1,000 residents of FEMA Trailers in and around New Orleans.   Ms. Bartlett spent her first law school summer working on issues relating to African American land loss in North Carolina, and her second summer addressing environmental justice and Hurricane Katrina-related human rights issues with Advocates for Environmental Human Rights in New Orleans.  Prior to law school, Ms. Bartlett worked with non-governmental organizations in California, Nepal, Ghana, Bangladesh and India, on issues relating to social and environmental justice.  After law school, Ms. Bartlett will move to New Orleans, where she is founding a nonprofit organization called the Louisiana Justice Institute (LJI) with several local attorneys.  LJI will focus on fostering social justice campaigns on behalf of impoverished communities and communities of color across Louisiana.

2006

Antonia Fasanelli (Alumna or Alumnus Whose Work is Primarily In the United States):
Antonia Fasanelli is the Staff Attorney of the Crowell & Moring Affordable
Housing Initiative at the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless. The
Initiative aims to preserve and expand affordable housing in the District of
Columbia by providing legal representation to tenants at risk of
displacement, advocating for policies that promote the preservation and
creation of affordable housing, and conducting educational workshops on
housing rights. The Initiative is an expansion of Antonia’s 2002-2004 Equal
Justice Works Fellowship, in which she focused on the preservation of
federally subsidized housing.

Since the creation of the Initiative in the fall of 2004, Antonia has advised,
represented, or consulted on the representation of tenants or tenant
associations at risk of displacement from over 2200 units of affordable
housing. She is an advisor to the D.C. Department of Housing and
Community Development on affordable housing preservation, and is an
advocate for improved operations within the D.C. Department of
Consumer and Regulatory Affairs and the D.C. Housing Authority.
Antonia regularly recruits attorneys and attorney teams from law firms to
provide pro bono representation to tenants and tenant associations. In
2005, she advised on the creation of the new D.C. Bar Affordable Housing
Preservation Project designed to recruit new attorneys to represent tenants
and tenant associations in affordable housing preservation cases.

Throughout law school, Antonia worked with low-income families at the
Legal Aid Society of New York and the Washington Legal Clinic, and
represented tenants at risk of eviction as a student attorney with the D.C.
Law Students in Court program. Before law school, she was closely
involved in national advocacy programs to prevent homelessness while an
Americorps*VISTA member at the National Law Center on Homelessness
& Poverty. In the year prior to her Equal Justice Works fellowship, Antonia
clerked for the Honorable Barefoot Sanders, Senior Judge of the U.S.
District Court for the Northern District of Texas.

Rachel Micah-Jones (Alumna or Alumnus Whose Work is Primarily
Outside the United States):
A 2005 Echoing Green Fellow, Rachel founded and serves as Executive
Director of Centro de los Derechos del Migrante (CDM), the first
transnational workers’ rights law center in central Mexico. With a base of
operations in Zactecas, CDM addresses workplace injustice by connecting
Mexico-based workers with U.S. advocates. Through outreach, referral
services, legal representation, and policy projects, CDM addresses issues
pertaining to migrant workers? rights. CDM is rapidly expanding its services
and is in the process of developing two specialized outreach programs – one
that focuses on migrant women and the other on health and safety.

Prior to founding CDM, Rachel worked with the Migrant Farmworker Unit
of Florida Rural Legal Services where she represented some of Florida’s
250,000 migrant workers. She worked on employment, housing and civil
rights matters, litigating cases in federal and state courts, including a case at
the federal appellate level. She also conducted worker education sessions
before immigrant farmworkers on basic labor and civil rights and prepared
bilingual legal educational materials relating to housing, civil and
employment issues.

Rachel received her J.D. from American University?s Washington College of
Law in 2003. At WCL, she was a student attorney in the International Human
Rights Clinic where she represented immigrant clients on a range of matters
before the Department of Homeland Security. She also worked as a law clerk
in the Civil Legal Services Unit of the Public Defender Service for the District
of Columbia.

Kelleen Corrigan (Current Washington College of Law Student):
Kelleen, a third year law student, is one of 11 of Public Interest/Public Service
Scholars in class of 2006. While at WCL, Kelleen has coordinated three
Alternative Spring Break (ASB) trips, including the inaugural one. For the
2006 ASB, 27 students traveled to the Gulf Coast region to offer post-
Hurricane Katrina legal and physical assistance. Also, during law school,
Kelleen organized an experiential learning project focusing on immigration
issues, acted as co-chair of the special contributions committee for the 2005
Equal Justice Foundation auction, and participated with Dean Claudio
Grossman in the UN Committee Against Torture meetings in Geneva,
Switzerland. Further, as a student attorney in the International Human
Rights Law Clinic, Kelleen represented a detained female client in her
removal hearing and conducted a fact-finding mission to Ciudad Juarez,
Mexico to investigate the claims of a mother whose daughter was murdered.
An EJF fellowship recipient for the past two summers, she spent one summer
working on detention issues with the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center
(FIAC) in Miami, Florida, and her second summer working on Inter-
American human rights cases with the Center for Legal and Social Studies
(CELS) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Kelleen is currently a law clerk with the
Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia.

Prior to law school, Kelleen was a volunteer with Peace Brigades
International (PBI) in Bogota, Colombia, where she provided non-violent
protective accompaniment to threatened human rights defenders. She is
currently a member of the PBI-USA board of directors. She is also the cochair
of the Colombia Human Rights Committee, a DC-based organization
dedicated to supporting human rights and peace in Colombia.

After law school, Kelleen will return to FIAC in Miami to work as an
immigration attorney, funded through a 2006 Equal Justice Works
fellowship.

2005

Kevin Layton (Alumnus/a Working in the US): A 1997 graduate of WCL, Kevin Layton is the Deputy Political Director of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC). With over 600,000 members, HRC is the nation'’s largest gay political and civil rights organization. Mr. Layton manages HRC’s grassroots and federal and state electoral teams to support the organization's federal and state legislative and electoral activities on matters of concern to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community. In the spring of 2003, Mr. Layton co-taught Sexual Orientation and the Law as an adjunct faculty member of WCL.

Neha Misra (Alumnus/a Working Outside the US): A 1994 graduate of WCL, Neha Misra has worked vigorously around the world to promote the rule of law. For over ten years, her work has focused on issues related to labor, workers' rights, gender, trafficking in persons, and democracy and elections. Ms. Misra worked in Bosnia and Herzegovina on post-war democracy and in the United States as a Senior Attorney-Advisor with the U.S. Department of Justice. Since 1998, Ms. Misra has worked in Jakarta, Indonesia for the American Center for International Labor Solidarity, AFL-CIO, where she has directed projects on democracy/elections, labor law reform and implementation, and human trafficking. Her work has been recognized by the governments of the United States and Indonesia as one of the key factors for a decrease in the reported incidence of human trafficking in Indonesia.

Amy Zaremba (WCL Student): A 2005 graduate of WCL, Amy Zaremba has been a steadfast advocate for the poor. She is currently director of the Transition Assistance Program, an outreach program in Washington , DC that works with the homeless, ex-offenders, and people in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction. At WCL, she co-chaired the Equal Justice Foundation, which raised enough money to award over 35 $3,000 fellowships to other WCL students working in the public interest sector for the summer. Ms. Zaremba has provided criminal legal defense and prior to law school worked with homeless populations in Chicago, Philadelphia and Boston to provide child care, job coaching, and other essential services.

2004

Erin Loubier (Alumnus/a Working in the US): A 1998 graduate of WCL, Erin Loubier serves as a public benefits attorney at the Whitman-Walker Legal Services Program in Washington, DC, where she provides representation to HIV-positive and AIDS-infected clients. Through Whitman-Walker she also trains volunteers, participates in local benefits coalitions, oversees the development of publications and other resources, and supervises weekly clinics. Prior to law school, Ms. Loubier assumed a leadership role at the National Association for Public Interest Law (NAPIL), paving the way for WCL to host NAPIL's public interest career fair for several years. As a law student, she participated in numerous public interest activities within the law school community, including serving as Director of WCL's Equal Justice Foundation.

Felipe Gonzalez (Alumnus/a Working Outside the US): A 1991 LLM graduate of WCL, Felipe Gonzalez serves as a law professor and Vice-Director of the Center on Research at Diego Portales University in Santiago, Chile. He is also Director of the Latin American University Program on Public Interest and Human Rights Law. Professor Gonzalez has obtained funding to develop law clinics throughout South America that focus on human rights. He has taken numerous cases of human rights violations to the Inter-American System of Protection of Human Rights and has published extensively on human rights.

Shirley Rivadeneira (WCL Student):  A 2004 graduate of WCL, Shirley Rivadeneira has been a steadfast advocate for a living wage among low-wage workers. For the past two years she served as Chair of the Living Wage Committee for the National Lawyers Guild and was active in the American University Living Wage Campaign. Ms. Rivadeneira further dedicated her talents to the workers at WCL by offering classes in English as a Second Language. She was also a student attorney with the International Human Rights Law Clinic at WCL and a volunteer for the Capital Area Immigrant Rights Coalition, where she volunteered to visit detained immigrants in federal prisons.

2003

Maria-Cristina Fernandez (Alumnus/a Working in the US): A 1992 graduate of WCL, Ms. Fernandez is managing director of the Latin American Youth Center, an organization serving young Latinos and families in Washington DC that is one of the largest non-profit service providers in the District. The Center provides innovative educational, health, and workforce programs, including sponsorship of a Ben & Jerry's ice cream shop that employs local youth. Ms. Fernandez also chairs the DC Citizen Complaint Review Board, which resolves citizens' complaints against local police officers. Previously, she served as a congressional staffer, a prosecutor, a poverty lawyer, and a policy advisor on violence against women/ juvenile violence. 

Victor E. Abramovich (Alumnus/a Working Outside the US): A 2000 masters' degree recipient from WCL, Mr. Abramovich is executive director of the Center of Legal and Social Studies (CELS), the premier nongovernmental organization (NGO) for human rights in Argentina. In this capacity, he achieved a landmark settlement in which the government acknowledged its culpability in the case of a minor who died while in police custody, and CELS became the first NGO to use the independent evaluation office of the International Monetary Fund to challenge its policies in a particular country. Mr. Abramovich is the author of two books on social rights, and has taught extensively on the topic.

Melanie Gabrielle Orhant (WCL Student): A third-year law student at WCL, Ms. Orhant already has a decade's worth of experience in the protection of victims of trafficking in forced labor. She has founded Action for REACH OUT, which supports and advocates for women working in the commercial sex industry in Hong Kong. She has also initiated a national and international network of organizations working on trafficking; these are Freedom Network (USA) and the Global Alliance Against Trafficking in Women, Thailand. After graduation, Ms. Orhant will work at Ayuda, Inc. in Washington, DC on an anti-trafficking project that will provide educational materials, pro bono legal services and outreach networks to assist trafficked persons.

2002

Angus Love (Alumnus/a Working in the US): A 1975 graduate of WCL, Angus Love has served since 1989 as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project, which provides free legal services to 70,000 institutionalized persons in Pennsylvania. He litigates cases ranging from physical abuse of prisoners to the high cost of telephone calls originating from prison facilities. Mr. Love won an equal protection challenge against the Pennsylvania Motor Voter Act of 1995, which sought to disenfranchise ex-felons for a period of five years. He notes that he began representing inmates when, as a student at WCL, he participated in a legal clinic that represented inmates at the Lorton Reformatory. Mr. Love, who has authored numerous publications on prison issues, has also served on numerous boards and commissions, including as Chair of the Civil Rights Committee of the Philadelphia Bar Association and member of the Board of Directors of the Philadelphia Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.

Romina Picolotti (Alumnus/a Working Outside the US): A 1999 recipient of a Masters in International Law from WCL, Romina Picolotti is founder and director of the Access to Justice Program of the Center for Human Rights and the Environment in Cordoba, Argentina. Ms. Picolotti's work focuses on the protection of the human rights of indigenous peoples, who suffer disproportionately from the adverse effects of unsustainable natural resources extraction. She obtained an injunction from the Organization of American States against the government of Nicaragua to halt private ventures in indigenous areas of the Atlantic coast. This groundbreaking decision and a subsequent victory in the case before the Inter-American Court on Human Rights have paved the way for an entirely new form of advocacy for environmental issues at human rights tribunals. Ms. Picolotti likewise seeks to have environmental issues addressed by bodies such as the World Trade Organization and United Nations agencies working on racism and discrimination. 

Edna Yang (WCL student): A 2002 WCL graduate who was a student of Peter Cicchino in the last year of his life, Edna Yang has devoted her law school career to public interest work. She has taught high school students about their constitutional rights, and has helped students who have dropped out, aged out, or been expelled from high school to earn their high school diplomas. Ms. Yang has worked at organizations providing legal services to immigrants and victims of domestic violence. She has spent summers at Legal Services of Southeastern Michigan, University Legal Services, and Neighborhood Legal Services in Washington, DC. After graduation, Ms. Yang will move to rural Texas to search for a legal services position.

2001

Jonathan Shapiro (WCL Graduate Working Primarily Within the U.S.): Mr. Shapiro has distinguished himself as a criminal defense attorney, particularly in capital punishment cases, some of which he has pursued all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Mr. Shapiro made the news when he was knocked unconscious by one of his clients in court, but nonetheless sought to remain counsel.

Marcela Huaita Alegre & Luz Rioseco (WCL Graduates Working Primarily Outside the U.S.): Both awardees in this category received their LL.M. degrees in International Legal Studies with Specializations in Gender and the Law. Ms. Alegre has returned to Peru, and Ms. Rioseco has returned to Chile; in their home countries, both work with women's rights organizations and teach law school courses on women's rights.

Angela Conyers & Stephanie Joseph (Current WCL Students): For the past two years, Ms. Conyers and Ms. Joseph have provided educational, emotional, and legal support for incarcerated teen girls at a Washington-area detention facility.  Their project began as part of a WCL program that teaches local high school students the basics of constitutional law, but the awardees developed a new program that also teaches criminal law to assist detainees through the juvenile justice system.

2000

Lydia Watts (WCL Graduate Working Primarily Within the U.S.): A 1996 graduate of WCL, Ms. Watts is the co-founder, Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer of Women Empowered Against Violence, Inc. (WEAVE), a D.C. non-profit organization that offers legal services and support to survivors of domestic violence. Ms. Watts and her co-founders conceived the idea of WEAVE while students in WCL's Domestic Violence Law Clinic. For the first year of WEAVE's operations, with an operating budget of $500, Ms. Watts alone provided all the direct representation and other services to women who sought WEAVE's assistance. WEAVE now assists hundreds of area women in gaining access to the justice system's protections and victim counseling, thanks in large part to Ms. Watts' diligence and efforts.

Hassan Jabareen (WCL Graduate Working Primarily Outside the U.S.): A 1996 LLM graduate of WCL, Mr. Jabareen is the founder and General Director of Adalah, the legal center for Arab minority rights in Israel. Established in 1996, Adalah is the first Arab-run legal center in Israel and works to use Israeli domestic law and international human rights standards to achieve equal rights for all in Israel. Under Mr. Jabareen's direction, Adalah has submitted petitions to the Supreme Court of Israel to prevent budgetary inequality in allocations made by the Religious Ministry and to obtain preventive health services for women and children in "unrecognized" villages. Mr. Jabareen has also taught civil rights courses at Haifa University, Rupin College and Tel Aviv University.  Prior to founding Adalah, he worked for four years as a Staff Attorney with the Association for Civil Rights in Israel.

Cathleen Caron (Current WCL Student): A 2000 graduate of WCL, Ms. Caron has been an active member of the Equal Justice Foundation, the Women's Law Association, and the National Lawyers Guild.  Before attending law school, Ms. Caron was the regional coordinator of the Indigenous Rights Accord for the United Nations Mission to Guatemala. She continued her public interest commitments while in law school, interning with the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe at the Tribal Attorney's Office and last summer with the Southern Poverty Law Center in Alabama. Ms. Caron has also represented natives of Guatemala and Cameroon in asylum claims before the Immigration and Naturalization Service as a Student Attorney with WCL's International Human Rights Law Clinic.

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