Access

ACCESS TO JUSTICE ISLP Projects that promote access to justice have included providing training and assistance to nascent public defender offices, prisoners' rights efforts, and the support of the drafting of domestic violence, freedom of information, and other critical legislation. Several examples are described below: Award-winning Work with the Liberian Ministry of Justice Since 2007, Canadian law firm Blakes has volunteered the expertise of one of its most senior lawyers, Jim Dube of its Toronto office, to ISLP for an ongoing project to provide assistance with the restoration of the legal system of Liberia in West Africa. With Blakes' support, Jim has made several long-term onsite trips to Liberia over the past five years where, as a general advisor, he is involved in many of the most significant and urgent matters affecting the work of the Ministry. Jim is currently helping to harmonize Liberia’s legal system with its indigenous customary legal system – a task that included analyzing 150 years of Liberian jurisprudence. In 2012, Jim was honored with an invitation to attend President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's inauguration for a second term while he was in Liberia for ISLP. Jim Dube (Blakes) with Liberia's Minister of Justice, Christina Tah Legal Aid Support in Cambodia Legal Support for Women and Children (LSCW) is a Cambodia NGO that provides legal aid to victims of human trafficking, sexual violence, and domestic violence. LSCW requested ISLP's assistance to develop a litigation manual to guide and focus the efforts of the junior law graduates and interns – on whom LSCW's few staff attorneys rely heavily. Kathleen Payne, a career prosecutor for the State of Oregon and head of the Domestic Violence Unit, spent two months in Pnom Penh preparing the manual. International Bridges to Justice, an NGO that works in several countries in Asia and Africa to build their public defender systems, provide indigent accused with access to counsel, and thereby to reduce the incidence of torture of prisoners by authorities in those countries, requested a senior public defender from the US to work with its public defender leader in Cambodia. Norm Sepenuk traveled from from Washington state to Phnom Penh to spend a month working directly with local defenders to develop a practice manual. Partnering with Ethiopian Public Defenders to Grow Capacity in Oromiya State ISLP began working with the Oromia State Justice Sector Professionals Training and Research Institute in 2009 to help build the capacity of the state's public defenders. Volunteers Peter Nimkoff and Jim Gildersleeve, veteran public defenders from New York State with more than five decades of collective experience, were the first ISLP volunteers to partner with the Institute, helping it develop a short training course for the criminal defense bar. Andy Haas, a public defender from Alaska followed, completing a training manual in the use of international human rights law in domestic proceedings to be used in future trainings. During his 6 weeks onsite, Mr. Haas also delivered the training to several groups of prosecutors and judges. Charles Davison, a career public defender from Edmonton, Canada, developed and delivered a training module on plea bargaining at the Institute – a procedure likely to become available in Ethiopia for the first time after an upcoming revision of the criminal procedure code. Later, Peter Nimkoff and Jim Gildersleeve returned to Ethiopia at the request of the Institute for further assistance in developing plans for a post-graduate, pre-employment certificate course for incoming public defenders. Mr. Nimkoff and Mr. Gildersleeve worked with Institute staff, law professors, members of the judiciary, and public defenders to outline a six-month curriculum for the certificate course. Supporting Kenya's First Legal Aid Clinic for People with Disabilities ISLP received a request from startup NGO the Disability Legal Resource Centre in Kenya for help in establishing the first legal aid clinic in the country for persons with disabilities. Paul-Claude Bérubé, a global expert in disabilities law, traveled to Kenya to assist the leadership in developing a strategic plan for opening the Centre. Mr. Berube continues to provide assistance and input from his home in Québec, Canada. Strengthening Rule of Law in Malawi In 2010 the Ministry of Justice in Malawi extended a request to ISLP for assistance in providing trial advocacy training to its prosecutors and legal aid lawyers. Bill Gardner, a former DOJ prosecutor who retired after 25 years of private practice in white collar criminal defense, traveled to Malawi to kick off the multi-year project, a mission that included interviewing legal aid lawyers, prosecutors, judges, and other stakeholders and beginning to design the course curriculum.


Each year, the Human Rights Centre at the University of Pretoria trains 30 of Africa’s most promising human rights lawyers in its LLM program. ISLP volunteer Joel Martin (center) first took on this 3-month assignment in South Africa in 2008, establishing the Center’s first-ever trial advocacy seminar. He additionally ran a clinic that undertook legal research on behalf of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights, and lectured on US constitutional law. Mr. Martin was enthusiastically invited to return and subsequently expanded this program teaching lawyering skills to Africa's premiere group of young human rights lawyers. Volunteer Bill Gardner (2nd on left) in India with magistrates of the District Court, Tis Hazari, in Delhi. ISLP sent Mr. Gardner in response to a request from the Judge of the Delhi High Court for an expert to help train and educate magistrates in the application of plea bargaining. The court at Tis Hazari has backlogs of cases in the tens of thousands and it is not uncommon for magistrates (who hear cases where the maximum penalty does not exceed 7 years in jail) to have 600-900 cases on their docket. Mr. Gardner successfully conveyed the potential benefits of plea bargaining to stakeholders, including judges, prosecutors, and legal aid lawyers. He also recommended a procedure, adopted by the Court, to appoint a special magistrate to preside over plea bargain requests to ensure that they would be heard expeditiously and would not be prejudiced in the event that a plea bargain is not reached.		Volunteers Peter Nimkoff and Jim Gildersleeve (back row center) pose in traditional robes presented to them by public defenders in Oromiya, Ethiopia. An open-air courtroom in Blantyre, Malawi, where an ISLP volunteer - a senior public defender from Minneapolis - assisted junior lawyers with a homicide trial and provided trial advocacy training.