Peter Dellinger, Eoin Gallagher ’23, Rae Shih, Anne Marie Marcoccia ’24, Michaela Reisdorf ’24, Matthew Mendoza ’23 and Community Engagement Legal Clinic Director, Prof. Kim Diana Connolly.
#UBLawResponds
Providing service and promoting justice through clinic programs
Robust legal education extends beyond the classroom. At UB School of Law, student attorneys use their developing skills and knowledge in the community to make a real difference in the advancement of justice. In the process, they’re a vital force for good for clients in need, throughout Western New York and beyond.
Those opportunities take many forms, including a wide variety of externship and fellowship placements in government and non-profit organizations; the chance to spend their final semester serving the public as Pro Bono Scholars; and the ever-increasing range of UB Law clinics. Read on for updates on the incredible work recently done in our Clinical Legal Education Program—work that, for both our students and their clients, changes lives.
Western New York’s burgeoning biotech sector has received major support from students in the Entrepreneurship Law Clinic, where student attorneys are providing the legal advice that enables small start-up companies to reach for big goals. To date, the clinic — directed by Matthew Pelkey ’10 — has worked with more than 142 start-ups and has helped to create or retain more than 110 jobs. “Our team had little understanding of what it meant to start a company,” says one founder of a firm that’s seeking to create personalized cancer therapies. “The clinic gave us insight into corporate structure, best practices, regulatory pathways, and helped us set up the company from the ground up.”
Work by students in the Environmental Advocacy Clinic gained international exposure at an important conference on global wetlands preservation. Student attorneys provided daily research during the 2022 Conference of the Contracting Parties to the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, held in Geneva, Switzerland. Their work supported the World Wetland Network, which builds capacity in local communities to protect these vital biomes. The students’ research was part of the clinic’s continuing effort to increase public recognition of wetland ecosystems worldwide.
Mediation Clinic Director Steve Sugarman ’85 with student attorneys.
“Gain a new superpower!” touted publicity for a day of enriching skill-building through a Youth Conflict Resolution Training run by student attorneys in the Mediation Clinic. Designed for young people ages 15 to 21, some of whom have been involved in the child welfare system, the full-day training taught negotiation tactics and other skills to help them navigate conflicts in their lives, advocate for themselves effectively, and communicate better with peers and adults. “We wanted to emphasize to the participants that they all have a voice,” says Abigail Jackson ’23, “and that their voices matter.”
For the sixth time, students in the Puerto Rico Recovery Assistance Legal Clinic traveled to the island to support the continuing rebuilding effort following the devastation of Hurricane Maria in 2017 and severe earthquakes in 2019. Ten student attorneys spent a week meeting with community partners and government leaders, with a focus on developing policy, improving resilience, and identifying the population’s most urgent legal and policy needs. Among those they’ve identified: a severe need for mental health services, as well as improved access to justice, water, energy, and food.
Student attorneys MacKenzie Vergason ’24 and Jared Waldron ’23 at the Fourth Department, where Waldron presented his first appellate oral argument on behalf of Housing Opportunities Made Equal (HOME).
In a free society, the work of defending civil rights and demanding transparency from government is never-ending. Students in the Civil Rights and Transparency Clinic (CRTC)— with guidance from clinic director, Professor Heather Abraham —have taken on a broad portfolio of issues, working to safeguard those rights and give citizens the tools they need to ensure accountability.
To enforce civil rights and protect our democracy, student attorneys:
- Compiled a self-help guide for people seeking government records through New York State’s Freedom of Information Law.
- Filed a Freedom of Information Law request followed by a lawsuit to secure public records on proposed funding for the new Buffalo Bills stadium on behalf of Investigative Post, a local non-profit investigative news organization.
- Drafted demand letters to police departments that refused to disclose officer disciplinary records, as required after New York repealed a law that once shielded those records from public view. They later filed lawsuits against those departments and are currently litigating to obtain the records as a part of a state-wide collaboration with other legal and news organizations.
In recognition of the public obstacles encountered by transgender and gender nonconforming individuals, the CRTC has initiated the following:
- In collaboration with BestSelf Behavioral Health and Neighborhood Legal Services, student attorneys have advised and represented clients seeking to change their legal names to align with their identities. The students met with clients, conducted intake interviews, provided advice and counsel, and completed the required petitions. They also helped clients invoke New York State’s new provision on official documents, such as driver’s licenses, providing the option to choose the gender marker “X” rather than “Male” or “Female.”
- In partnership with Gay and Lesbian Youth Services, student attorneys created and delivered a “know your rights” community presentation for parents of transgender, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming youth.
Student attorneys also challenged unlawful debt collections as a civil rights issue. Taking a creative approach to the vexing problem of individual consumer debt, they served clients contesting debts that have been erroneously attributed to them or unlawfully secured by default judgment. Working with the Western New York Law Center’s CLARO (Civil Legal Advice Resource Office) Program, students met with low-income clients at the public library to advise them of their rights. Typically, clients had received notice of default on a debt or notice of garnishment—especially problematic for people living paycheck to paycheck. The students assessed their situation, reviewed the legal options, drafted motions, responded to discovery requests, and appeared in Buffalo City Court seeking to vacate judgments or stay proceedings.
The Community Engagement Legal Clinic (CELC) was first created in response to legal issues generated by the COVID-19 pandemic, but its focus has rapidly broadened to include other pressing issues. Addressing legal needs brought forward by community partners, student attorneys tackle access to justice on several fronts. These have included assessing the adequacy of police training, examining civil responses to racially motivated violence, advocating for the rights of non-professional school employees to secure access to unemployment benefits during COVID-19, and protecting the civil rights of veterans. With new funding in the amount of $100,000, secured by New York State Assemblywoman Latoya Joyner ’12 (District 77) and supported by Assemblymembers Monica Wallace ’94 (District 143), Karen McMahon ’86 (District 146), and Patrick Burke (District 142), the clinic is expanding its history of representing individuals applying for unemployment insurance benefits.
Among the clinic’s most recent work:
- Local parents and guardians of students in the Buffalo Public Schools have benefited from “know your rights” presentations by an expert coalition including student attorneys, educating the local community on school suspension policies, informing them of rights under state education law, and confronting issues of racial inequality. Research shows that Black students often are more likely to be suspended, and for longer periods of time, than white students who have committed similar infractions. Student attorneys worked with families seeking to challenge unjust suspensions.
- Partnering with the New York State Department of Veterans’ Services, student attorneys have worked on cutting-edge legal issues affecting veterans. UB Law was one of four New York State law schools to receive a $150,000 grant from the state’s “Justice for Heroes” program, targeting “innovative collaborative programs to assist veterans, service members and their family members with previously unmet legal needs.”
The clinic provides legal services free of charge to veterans, service members and their families to help with matters identified as underserved by experts and community partners, including Western New York Heroes, in coordination with expert volunteer lawyers. “As is true in many places across the country, Western New York veterans often face severe access to justice issues,” says CELC Clinic Director Kim Diana Connolly. “Our longstanding clinical program has deep expertise, such as family law issues, small business and entrepreneurship needs, public benefits appeals and civil matters.”
Perhaps nowhere is the need for access to justice more apparent—and increasingly critical—than in criminal legal defense. The Criminal Justice Advocacy Clinic, in partnership with the law school’s Innocence and Justice Project—both led by Professor Alexandra Harrington—steps up to meet that need. Their efforts include a variety of initiatives aimed at providing legal assistance to individuals navigating the criminal system and policy work focused on making the system more just, such as:
- New York State’s recently enacted Domestic Violence Survivors Justice Act (DVSJA), which affords individuals the opportunity to reduce their sentences for crimes connected to domestic violence they suffered. The clinic is working to make that promise a reality for incarcerated survivors of domestic violence. Student attorneys meet with incarcerated clients, gather evidence and prepare resentencing applications. Clinic students represent applicants at resentencing hearings and on appeal. One recent success: The clinic represented one of the few incarcerated persons to be resentenced under the DVSJA. This was the first case to adopt reasoning that the DVSJA could be used to decrease a period of post-release supervision.
- Student attorneys also represent individuals preparing for hearings before the New York State Board of Parole, as well as those appealing denials of parole. A team of student attorneys secured a new parole hearing for a clinic client who had been improperly denied parole after serving more than 25 years in prison with an exemplary record. On re-hearing in July of 2023, that client was granted parole. Another client serving an indeterminate life sentence obtained parole at her first hearing.
- In addition to work on behalf of individual clients, the clinic’s work includes policy advocacy, pressing for justice on a systemic level. Clinic representatives, including Professor Harrington and Alexis DiCarlo ’24, traveled to Albany for Parole Justice Advocacy Day, where advocates from around the state urged the State Legislature to pass two bills that would make the parole process in New York more equitable for all.
FVWRC Clinic Director Judith Olin ’85, Teresa Cappiello ’24, Jordynn-Celeste Harter ’23, Lindsey Pastuszynski ’23, Lexi Horton ’24, NYS Assemblymember Karen McMahon ’86, Shelby Majda ’24, Mykala Pierce ’23, Shamira Nawz ’23 and Jake Giovati ’23.
It has been estimated that domestic violence accounts for 21 percent of all violent crime. The dedicated students in the Family Violence and Women’s Rights Clinic (FVWRC) are addressing that sad reality through advocacy, education and client service—a multi-pronged approach to what sometimes seems an intractable challenge.
Recent projects aimed at abating domestic violence issues include:
- Outreach to the area teenage population with video and other materials to educate them about the potential for dating violence. “Teen dating violence is pretty nuanced,” says Lindsey Pastuszynski ’23, who designed and delivered training to over 50 teens at the Healthy Relationship Summit held at the Buffalo History Museum last February. “There are different aspects of power and control issues, such as controlling friendships; isolation; and modern issues like sexting and revenge porn that weren’t being addressed.”
- A continuation of the clinic’s important work in direct client service, as students prepared emergency family offense petitions for family violence survivors seeking an order of protection in Family Court. In the past year, students have succeeded in securing more than 20 emergency temporary orders of protection for their clients. In addition, students represented clients in cases involving civil family offenses, custody and visitation, child support and divorce. At any given time, the clinic’s docket has about 15 such cases ongoing.
- Creating toolkits and trainings for court watchers in several local courts in Western New York, enabling them to assess how well the courts ensure the safety of domestic violence survivors when they interact with the court system—a situation that can be a flashpoint for further violence.
- The clinic is celebrating a major new allocation from the Erie County Legislature—$500,000 over three years—that will enable it to improve civil legal services for targets of domestic violence in Erie County. The new money, championed by Legislator Jeanne Vinal ’89, will enable the clinic to hire another fulltime staff attorney to supervise the students’ legal work, making it possible for them to represent more clients. And recognizing the importance of a holistic approach to helping clients, the allocation will make it possible to include a social work presence on the clinic team.