Serving Clients in the Human Rights at Home Litigation Clinic During a Pandemic

07/23/2020

In mid-March, the entire student body along with the professors had to rapidly adapt to legal education taking on an entirely new format.

But the students and professors in the Legal Clinics had an additional challenge – how to help their clients.

The new Human Rights at Home Litigation Clinic had just launched in January, and now its students and director Prof. Lauren Bartlett were thrown further into unfamiliar territory.

“We had very little ‘normal’ times,” Bartlett said. Her clinic primarily serves immigrant clients on issues that are ancillary to their immigration status, such as workers’ issues, housing issues, domestic violence and more. While there are a few local places that provide legal resources specific to immigration law – Catholic Legal Assistance Ministry (CLAM) located in Scott Hall being one of them – there are not nonprofit legal organizations that address other needs of immigrant clients specifically.

Second-year clinic student Courtney Federico said she has focused on immigration in her legal studies for that reason.

“A lot of people don’t realize the impact other issues can have on immigration – just pleading wrong to something can impact your status, and immigrants’ cases need to be handled differently because of the impact it can have overall,” Federico said.

“For my clients, there’s this whole other discrimination level,” Bartlett said. “We had clients who are asylees, hold green cards and are in the process of becoming U.S. citizens who wanted guardianship of their adult son, and the first attorney they went to said ‘You have to be a citizen or the court won’t let you.’ And that’s wrong information.

“Some of it is systemic, some of it is just [lack of] knowledge,” she continued. “Some of it is really people who are being discriminatory purposefully, like employers and landlords.”

These issues have been exacerbated in light of COVID-19.

“Since the coronavirus, things have gotten a lot worse for our clients in terms of discrimination and in terms of fear,” Bartlett said. “Most or all of them are out of work right now. Most work in hotels, grocery stores, restaurants, construction. Even those who have green cards are really worried about getting diagnosed with the virus and having to seek out health care and being unemployed. They don’t want to become a public charge . Some have applied for unemployment, but there are lots of concerns about what that means for their ability to stay in the country, what that means for their kids.

“My students did a great job of working on their cases [at the beginning of the semester], doing what they’re supposed to do, and then suddenly there was this flood of all these other things they are experiencing,” Bartlett continued. “It’s been hard because we can’t meet the demand.”

She and the students try to do so by fielding as many inquiries as they can. They also created an information sheet in multiple languages that they have been distributing, which contains details about food banks, health clinics, COVID-19 testing, stimulus payment information and the moratorium on evictions.

Even in the middle of all this, there are small wins and successes."

Prof. Lauren Bartlett

“Every one of them recognized there was this huge need and they have special skills to respond,” she said. “The clinic was an outlet for that because they’re helping individuals in a tangible way. Even in the middle of all this, there are small wins and successes.”

Remote Challenges

Continuing to work with clients from the students’ various locations at home created its own challenges.

Confidentiality and communication became complicated: because Federico and her clinic partner were both living with others, they had to make sure they never said their clients’ names aloud. Some clients had language barriers and could only communicate through translators. One judge had heard about “Zoom-bombing,” so had Bartlett figure out a landline-based conference call service for a hearing instead. They learned how to conduct remote notarizations. Hearings were pushed back repeatedly.

And then there were the cases themselves. The clinic immediately saw a huge spike in unpaid wages claims.

“We had a client come to us who was working for three months alongside five other men and never got paid; they were told they were going to be fired and immigration was going to be called on them,” Federico said. “They just had to leave and couldn’t fight for their payment.” The client had been brought to the U.S. by that company with the promise of a job, and now it threatened him with deportation.

She says this points to a bigger systemic issue of a lack of protection for immigrants.

“We have this idea in our heads of what trafficking is, but we forget that it is also people who are trying to get a better life for their family and are being convinced by employers to come to America, take this job,” she said. “So many people come without doing it through ‘legal means,’ and once you’re here it’s hard to fix that and do it through the legal means; you really don’t have a pathway. So they’re trapped in this situation.”

Perhaps even more jarring than the increase in certain types of cases is the decrease of others.

“I was getting calls every week about protection orders, and I haven’t gotten one since this happened,” Bartlett said. “I think it’s because the person is with their abuser, wherever they are. We have several clients who are survivors of domestic violence who have temporary protection orders and are trying to make them longer term, and their hearings are being pushed back. There are lots of questions about whether the respondent is getting the information, and if the respondent is in jail, is he going to be released because of coronavirus.”

One of the protection order requests that came in before everything shut down was fielded by Onalee Chappeau, a 3L who had done clinic during the fall 2019 semester and had worked closely with a client on another issue. That client contacted her directly after a domestic violence incident early in the spring semester, and even though Chappeau was no longer a clinic student, she agreed to take the case under Bartlett’s guidance.

“[The client and I] went to the courthouse together on a very cold and windy day, and she filled out the paperwork,” Chappeau said. “At that time, we didn’t know it would be months before the order of protection would be final. When the court[houses] first closed back in March, I made sure to update her regularly. The biggest hurdle was coordinating the [virtual] hearing time and the technology with the client. From my perspective, it was my first time doing any kind of questioning in front of a judge, and it felt a little weird to be sitting in my home office wearing a suit, instead of standing up in court. In the end, I think having the hearing over video made it more comfortable for her, since she was able to give her testimony and know that it was confidential.”

In mid-June, in the midst of studying for the bar exam, Chappeau completed the final hearing and successfully got the protection order for her client.

Some Constants Remain

Both Federico and Chappeau noted that one of the hardest parts about doing clinic work away from the clinic was missing out on the collegial atmosphere in Scott Hall.

“It was a safer environment being in clinic,” Federico said. “You have Prof. Bartlett right down the hall. I had 3Ls in the room and could look over and say ‘Hey, are you guys familiar with this kind of law?’ When you’re in your own home, it makes you more hesitant to ask.”

“The clinic is such a great, open, collaborative community,” Chappeau agreed. “During the pandemic, Prof. Bartlett and I tried to maintain this style of communication using email, phone and text.”

“Prof. Bartlett was very understanding and very much in control of the situation at all times,” Federico said. “She transitioned seamlessly, which helped us transition. And she emphasized that our health was also a priority.” She even offered to have Ted Drewes frozen custard delivered to her students living in town in lieu of the end-of-semester banquet they would have had.

Bartlett is just as complimentary of her students as they are of her.

“My students finished their hours, put in extra hours; they were diligent working on their cases,” she said. “I’ve heard from lots of other law schools, and half of their students are just ‘missing.’ My students definitely care about their clients.”

Working with my client reminded me that sometimes a critical part of a lawyer’s job is to show up and stay the course."

Onalee Chappeau, third-year law student

And at the end of the day, that commitment to the clients was what the students took away from the experience more than anything else.

“Working with my client reminded me that sometimes a critical part of a lawyer’s job is to show up and stay the course,” Chappeau said. “[It] was about doing little things throughout at six-month period – taking her to the courthouse to apply for the order, having hard conversations about the events leading up to needing the order, checking in throughout the pandemic, and being willing to ask the right questions during the hearing.”

After the hearing was over, Chappeau said her client told her, “I’m so proud of you! I’m so glad I was your first client.”

“And I said the same thing to her – I am so proud of how she advocated for her own safety, for the safety of her children and for their future. Being her lawyer was all about partnering with her.”

— By Maria Tsikalas