The Stein Scholars had a very busy fall, which included organizing and presenting panel discussions on three pressing topics: stop and frisk, gender discrimination in the legal profession, and alternatives to incarceration.
Floyd and the Future of Impact Litigation: Organizing for the Supreme Court’s Next Liberal Majority (September 28)
A robust conversation between an attorney, community organizer, artist and activist and one of the named plaintiffs in NYC’s stop and frisk lawsuit, Floyd v. City of New York, got the semester off to a strong start. Specifically, with Stein Scholar Frank Kearl ’18 as the moderator, Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, deputy director of impact litigation at the Bronx Defenders; Djibril Touré, representing Communities United for Police Reform; Jamel Mims, artist and activist with Stop Mass Incarceration Network, NYC Revolution Club, and Urban Arts Partnership; and David Ourlicht, named plaintiff in Floyd and J.D. candidate at CUNY School of Law, discussed topics such as Floyd v. City of New York and the precursor to Floyd, Daniels, et al. v. City of New York, et al.; next steps after the finding in Floyd that the NYPD engaged in a pattern and practice of racial profiling and unconstitutional stops; and community lawyering.
The panelists explored many complicated and interconnected topics, such as
- What is the best way for multiple stakeholders with different agendas to work together to implement solutions, in light of the Floyd decision?
- How should lawyers work with directly impacted communities to devise strategies and mobilize participation in lawsuits?
- What lessons can be learned for future efforts?
- Before the lawsuit was filed, many men of color knew that they were regularly targeted for stop and frisks, but they didn’t think they could do anything to change the situation. What role can lawyers play to empower a collective response to local or individual injustices?
- In the resource-scarce world of public interest lawyering, how can activists, affected communities, community organizers, legal organizations and lawyers join together to protect and expand the rights of marginalized communities?
Women in the Workplace: Gender Norms and Professionalism in the Legal Field (November 2)
The second panel of the semester, which was introduced by Stein Scholar Lorena Jiron ’17 and moderated by Claire Huntington, Associate Dean for Research and Professor of Law at Fordham Law School, was comprised of: 1) the Honorable Jenny Rivera, NY Court of Appeals; 2) Terry Lawson, director of the Family and Immigration Unit in LSNYC’s Bronx Office; 3) Margarita Guzman, executive director of the Bronx Family Justice Center and the Mayor’s Office to Combat Domestic Violence; and 4) Douglas Wigdor, founding partner of Wigdor, LLP, an employment litigation law firm. The speakers addressed a myriad of topics, including how women (and men) can deal with the challenges of outdated gender norms and expectations and what men and women can do to address workplace sexism, harassment, discrimination, and microaggressions while still staying true to one’s authentic self.
One topic that received a lot of attention is intersectionality—the interconnected nature of categories such as race, class, and gender and the relationship to overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination and disadvantage. Another topic that received significant attention is the toll experienced by many women attorneys who find themselves forced to internalize patriarchal norms and expectations in order to successfully and zealously represent clients.
Attendees learned that around 80 percent of women lawyers report that they have heard other lawyers making sexist remarks; only 18 percent of equity partners at firms are women. Additionally, many contract provisions—forced confidentiality clauses in settlements, arbitration provisions, etc.—keep women from knowing about discrimination experienced by other women in the workplace. The speakers expressed concern that, until firms in general and executive committees in particular are more diverse, there will be disparate treatment. Things are complicated for women in the nonprofit world, too. There is an expectation, particularly in this time of rapid technological change, that nonprofit and public interest lawyers will be present and working all the time—going to committee meetings, submitting grants, speaking on panels, tweeting about cases and events, responding to emails, etc.—which is impossible to reconcile with being a parent, especially to school-aged children.
The panelists concluded by reflecting on how far things have changed and how much change still needs to happen and by urging the audience not to be complacent.
Alternatives to Incarceration: Making a Different Road (November 9)
The final program of the fall semester, which examined alternatives to the present system of incarceration, was moderated by Stein Scholar Kathy Walter ’17 and comprised of four speakers, all of whom have first-hand experience with the criminal justice system:
1) Richard Stratton was convicted of conspiracy to import marijuana and hashish and sentenced to 25 years in prison. He became a jailhouse lawyer, had his sentence vacated, and was released after serving eight years. An award-winning writer and filmmaker, he is also qualified as an expert witness in state and federal courts in the areas of prison violence and prison culture.
2) Laura Whitehorn spent 14 years in prison for conspiracy against the United States and was released on parole in 1999. She advocates on behalf of Release Aging People in Prison/RAPP, which seeks to get elderly and infirm people released from prison.
3) Robert Galinsky is the director of tPOPP: The Power of Performance and Personality, which he makes available through Literacy for Incarcerated Teens, an initiative that seeks to end illiteracy among New York’s incarcerated young people by inspiring them to read and by creating school libraries in New York’s juvenile detention centers.
4) Krista Staropoli, a 1L Stein Scholar (Class of 2019), is the chief editor of Photo-Patch, which seeks to facilitate communication between children (the invisible victims of mass incarceration) and incarcerated parents by providing a mechanism to allow children to upload letters and pictures that they want to send to their parents, which the organization then prints, packages, and ships.
The discussion raised many challenging questions:
- How can we do our part to minimize the stigma and isolation experienced by the invisible victims of incarceration, the children?
- What does “alternatives to incarceration” mean?
- How can we mitigate against those aspects of the prison system that are motivated by business and profit concerns?
- What are the best mechanisms for ensuring that parole boards focus on public safety risks, as opposed to other factors?
- Can the goals of incarceration be shifted away from punishment and towards rehabilitation?
- How can legislatures be discouraged from creating new types of crimes, which often result in longer sentences, but do nothing to keep communities safe?
- Is there a role for collaborating with victims’ rights organizations?
- Can the system be encouraged to recognize that incarcerated individuals can change while in jail?
- If illiteracy is a major cause of crime, what is our obligation as a society to make sure teens receive a quality education while they are in jail?