Making a Difference through Pro Bono
Our pro bono work and commitment to community form a cornerstone of our firm’s legacy. Each year we strive to increase our participation and are proud of our efforts to help numerous clients around the globe. In 2012, 98% of lawyers in our U.S. offices contributed 20 or more pro bono hours. We are currently ranked 2nd in The American Lawyer’s Pro Bono Report.
Our achievements reflect the deep personal commitment of our lawyers and professionals who work tirelessly to give back to those in need. Globally, we engage in a broad range of pro bono activities and make charitable contributions to numerous causes, including those in education, healthcare, children’s and family services, arts and culture, and the environment. To cite one example, in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy we donated more than $100,000 to assist victims affected by this natural disaster.
Our commitment to helping those in need is shared by our professionals across the firm. In 2012, 98% of lawyers in our U.S. offices contributed 20 or more pro bono hours.
Selected by Bet Tzedek as Law Firm of the Year.
Helping Holocaust survivors secure pension payments
One of the firm’s largest pro bono initiatives is the work we do in conjunction with Bet Tzedek Legal Services and the Holocaust Survivors Justice Network to represent more than 115 Holocaust survivors who worked in Nazi-controlled ghettos during World War II, as well as many of their surviving spouses. Through our efforts, certain of our clients have obtained monthly pension payments and back payments from the German government, and others have received one-time, lump-sum payments. The back payments received to date total more than $280,000 and the monthly payments total more than $18,000 per month.
In addition, the firm is representing nine survivors in connection with the appeals of the initial denial of their applications. While the majority of the appeals are still pending, several have been decided in our clients’ favor. This is an extensive, multi-office initiative for the firm, with lawyers in our Atlanta, Frankfurt, Los Angeles, and New York offices handling these matters. In addition, lawyers in our Los Angeles and Atlanta offices have taken a significant leadership role by serving as coordinating counsel for the program. We received the Bet Tzedek Law Firm of the Year award for our work.
Paul Hastings secures third pro bono victory before the U.S. Supreme Court
The firm represented U.S. Army Sargeant Jeffrey Chafin in an international custody dispute involving his daughter. While stationed in Europe, Sgt. Chafin married a citizen of the U.K. and had a child. The couple divorced after returning to the U.S. and Ms. Chafin filed a petition under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, seeking a determination that her daughter’s country of “habitual residence” was the U.K. not the U.S. The district court concluded that the daughter’s country of habitual residence was the U.K. and Ms. Chafin returned with her daughter. Sgt. Chafin appealed to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, but the Eleventh Circuit dismissed the appeal as moot because his daughter had already left the U.S. In a unanimous decision, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Eleventh Circuit and ruled that the appeal was not moot simply because the child had been removed from the jurisdiction. Local counsel argued the case, and Paul Hastings lawyers partnered with the University of Pennsylvania Law School Supreme Court clinic to handle the briefing.
This is our third pro bono victory before the Supreme Court in the past three years. Previously, we helped secure a Supreme Court victory with important implications for immigration law in Vartelas v. Holder. And in 2010, we won a landmark Supreme Court victory for pro bono client Jose Padilla, who was facing deportation after accepting a plea deal.
Helping immigrant children make new lives in the U.S.
We continued our ongoing pro bono partnership with Kids In Need of Defense (KIND), which helps unaccompanied children escape intolerable conditions in their home countries and make new lives in the U.S. Paul Hastings dedicates several thousand pro bono hours to KIND annually, with lawyers from across the firm donating their time and legal expertise.
Recently, a team of lawyers from our New York office successfully obtained asylum for a young woman from Guatemala who fled her home country after she and her family received threats from organized criminal gangs. In addition, teams from our New York and Chicago offices worked together to secure T-Visas and employment authorizations for two young boys who fled to the U.S. to avoid gang violence in Ecuador. We also assisted two girls from El Salvador in obtaining legal permanent residency and reunited them with their mother after a five-year separation.
Just as important as the work we do assisting our clients with their most critical matters are our partnerships with them to help those less fortunate. We were honored to partner with longtime client GE on a KIND case in which two sisters from Mali were seeking asylum in the U.S. after suffering physical and emotional abuse from members of their community. Through our efforts the sisters were granted asylum and now thrive in the safe and nurturing environment provided by their half-sister. These are just a few examples of our work with this important organization.
Helping to streamline and standardize medical development processes
Paul Hastings works closely with Critical Path Institute (C-Path), a nonprofit entity representing a collaboration among pharmaceutical companies, as counsel handling a variety of legal needs. C-Path works to improve the efficiency of the development of drugs, diagnostics, and medical devices by creating new data, measurement, and methods standards. Establishing these standards also streamlines the regulatory submission process. In addition, C-Path works closely with the FDA, European Medicines Agency, and other regulatory agencies to accelerate the final review process to bring new, safe, and effective products to market. Recently, our New York and London lawyers worked together to help C-Path enter into a new collaboration to share and validate safety testing methods and gain recognition by the European Medicines Agency as a “small and medium-sized enterprise” — an important victory for the nonprofit. More than 40 lawyers from Paul Hastings have devoted their time to the organization’s efforts.
Lending our assistance to the U.S. presidential election
Teams from eight of our offices across the U.S. participated as part of Election Protection, a nonpartisan initiative backed by a coalition of legal and civil rights groups supporting and protecting voters’ rights, to assist with the 2012 U.S. presidential election. We joined with a number of other organizations and law firms to answer election-related calls from voters across the country, monitor polling places for compliance with local law, and make sure that voters displaced by Hurricane Sandy had access to voting facilities. We also collaborated with the Georgia Appleseed Center for Law and Justice on a data analysis project that focused on identifying recurring election problems in the state and recommended solutions to increase voter turnout.
Working with NASA to help the space shuttle reach its new home
For more than 15 years, the firm has provided pro bono counsel to the Intrepid Museum Foundation, which operates one of the world’s top maritime museums — the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York. We recently represented the Foundation in its acquisition of the space shuttle Enterprise from NASA and helped bring the retired shuttle to its new home on the flight deck of the U.S.S. Intrepid. Our lawyers worked closely with NASA on all legal negotiations, which encompassed the title transfer of the shuttle as well as the logistics of safely transporting the shuttle from Virginia to New York.
This was a unique and complex matter that required our lawyers to learn NASA’s procedures, as well as applicable regulatory restrictions. Our firm’s past work includes representing the museum in its 2003 acquisition of the decommissioned Concorde aircraft.
Helping to create a new family resource center
We also continued our strong support of Christopher House, a nonprofit based in Chicago dedicated to helping at-risk children. We served as pro bono counsel in all aspects of a recent project to help Christopher House construct and finance a new facility that will help the organization continue its vital work in providing early childhood development, family support, and educational services for children and their families. The facility will also be the site of Christopher House’s new Charter School and serve as the organization’s new headquarters. Lawyers and staff from our Chicago office regularly donate their time and resources to provide a variety of services to this worthy organization.
Leading research in the fight against violence and abuse toward women
In recognition of our status as one of the world’s leading global law firms, Paul Hastings was selected by Terre des Hommes to conduct multijurisdictional research and write an in-depth report on legislation aimed at fighting violence and abuse against young women. The study, Violence Against Young Women: A Human Rights Violation, is part of Terre des Hommes’ campaign “Indifesa” (Italian for helpless), which seeks to protect young women throughout the world from any form of violence, including female genital mutilation, sexual exploitation, and trafficking. Six teams located in the firm’s Milan, London, Paris, Frankfurt, New York, and Beijing offices analyzed the criminal statutes and case law that combat physical, sexual, psychological, and economic forms of violence against women in Asia, Europe, the U.S., and Canada.
The fight against violence and abuse of young girls and teenagers is a priority for every country and every international institution. Among the key findings was that the European Union can play a critical role in harmonizing the different types of offenses and the minimum sanctions that Member States must apply. The report was presented to the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Rome as part of the international Conference of the Council of Europe this past November. The complete report is available here.
Working to improve prison conditions
The firm partnered with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Southern California and the ACLU National Prison Project in an effort to end a pattern of violence by deputies against inmates in Los Angeles County jails. Paul Hastings, along with the ACLU and the National Prison Project, filed a federal class action lawsuit, Rosas v. Baca, in the Central District of California accusing Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca and his top command staff of ignoring a widespread culture of violence by deputies in the jails. The complaint, which lists dozens of incidents of violence, was challenged in court numerous times by Sheriff Baca. To date, each of those challenges has been unsuccessful. Sheriff Baca has now conceded that there is a problem in the system and that reforms are necessary. Our lawyers are currently working to obtain a binding court order to ensure that the reforms are enacted. We received the 2012 Prisoner Rights Advocacy Award from the ACLU Foundation of Southern California.
Creating the world’s largest shark sanctuary
Our pro bono efforts also include species conservation work. The firm assisted with a significant marine conservation initiative in the South Pacific. We advised the Pacific Islands Conservation Initiative (PICI) on its efforts to assist the Cook Islands government in establishing regulations to create a shark sanctuary in the territorial waters of the Cook Islands. The regulations prohibited certain commercial fishing activities within the islands’ exclusive economic zone (EEZ) — an area of ocean approximately 756,000 square miles in size — that threaten sharks, and also ban the possession, sale, and trade of shark and shark products. This newly established protected area neighbors the shark sanctuary recently announced by Tahiti Nui (French Polynesia), and will connect with the EEZs of American Samoa and Tokelau (a territory of New Zealand) to create the largest contiguous shark conservation area in the world. Paul Hastings represented the PICI in preparing the conservation regulations that were adopted by the Ministry of Marine Resources and ultimately signed into law.
Partnering with The Nature Conservancy
The firm began its relationship with The Nature Conservancy in 2007 with a single pro bono matter led by the firm’s New York-based international employment team. Since then our relationship has become global. Lawyers throughout our offices in the U.S. and China advise on pro bono matters ranging from international and domestic employment to real estate, litigation, and tax. The president of the Conservancy recently expressed his appreciation to the firm for the critical role we have played over the years in advancing their efforts.
