Duke University School of Law has received a $2.5 million commitment from the Barton Family Foundation to start a criminal defense clinic. The clinic will give students hands-on learning and course experience in criminal representation and train them to help end mass incarceration and racial injustice.
The Barton Family Foundation, based in Seattle, focuses its efforts on entities working to reform the criminal justice system in the U.S. and fix the social inequality that leads to incarceration.
“America’s criminal legal system is broken,” the Bartons said in a statement. “We are pleased to support a new clinic at Duke Law that will leverage the resources of the university and train future leaders in the fight against injustice.”
The clinic will join existing programs at Duke Law such as the Wilson Center for Science and Justice and the Wrongful Convictions Clinic and will facilitate collaborations between students and faculty.
—————————————————————
The University of Georgia School of Law received a major gift from renowned Georgia trial lawyer James Butler Jr. to expand the capabilities of its Veterans Legal Clinic. The clinic has helped 370 veterans and their families to recover more than $1 million in additional benefits since 2018.
Thanks to the generous gift from Mr. Butler, the clinic will be able to offer a virtual remote outreach program for Georgia veterans statewide, psychological and medical evaluations to determine the existence of invisible injuries sustained during military service, and self-advocacy webinars that will educate and empower former military members as they work with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and other agencies.
“I am grateful to Jim Butler for his steadfast commitment to Georgia’s veterans and the School of Law,” Dean Peter Rutledge said. “This latest funding will have a transformational impact on the services the Veterans Legal Clinic can provide. It will allow us to build our capacity and scale our efforts with new technologies, ultimately benefiting more Georgians who have served our country.”
—————————————————————
The Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University announced the launch of the Center for Constitutional Design. The goal of the center is to promote dialogue concerning the design of the Constitution and the interpretation thereof.
Backed by funding from ASU alumnus Jerry Hirsch, the center aims to inform the public about the application of the Constitution to recent public events and how the constitutional system can be improved or reformed.
“I’m excited to be part of a nationwide constitutional conversation that will both educate the public on the realities of the American constitutional system and generate new ideas about how to build a democratic society that is informed and empowered to guide and shape constitutional principles,” Hirsch said. “The center will spark the needed conversations to think about how our Constitution should be, rather than what it merely is.”
ASU Law professor Stefanie Lindquist will serve as the first executive director, with Jay Jenkins, the director of the Lodestar Dispute Resolution Center, serving as director and ASU Law Dean Emeritus Douglas Sylvester as special adviser.
—————————————————————
The IRS has awarded a 3-year, $300,000 grant to Lewis & Clark Law School to support the school’s Low Income Taxpayer Clinic. The clinic applies for these grants every three years and has been awarded the grant in every instance since the clinic’s founding more than 20 years ago.
“We are so grateful to the IRS for this ongoing support of our program,” said Assistant Clinical Professor of Law and LITC Director Sarah Lora. “This grant, together with other generous donations, enables us to provide need-based legal representation free-of-charge to qualified individuals in our community.”
The clinic offers a program for low-income taxpayers and taxpayers who speak English as a second language.
