Like so many who enter the Courthouse, she seemed forlorn and lost. But Ms. Jackson was searching for more than just the right room, and in her experience is another lesson in the value
of the presence of helpful lawyers in the Courthouse.Ms. Jackson is the mother of a 20 year old daughter with special needs. An Alabama judge had granted Ms. Jackson adult guardianship of her daughter, but her child had run to Atlanta where Ms. Jackson feared that the daughter was involved in the sex slave trade. Ms. Jackson had successfully petitioned the court in her home county in Alabama for an Order directing the sheriff to seize the child and to hand her over to the custody of her mother. Arriving here her finest clothes, Ms. Jackson was stunned to learn that the Atlanta Sheriff’s office would not simply ride out to the address where she believes her daughter is being held, possibly against her will, to retrieve her child. Unsophisticated about the legal process and unsure what to do next, she dissolved in tears and waited in the hallway, hoping for help and direction.
AVLF and its volunteer lawyers are now involved in four Fulton County Courthouse-based pro bono legal service programs. (One, the extremely exciting new Self-Help Center, will be the focus of next month’s blog.) Yesterday, Ms. Jackson was sent to one of those programs, the Safe Families Office, a partnership among AVLF, the Partnership Against Domestic Violence and the Superior Court of Fulton County Family Division that provides legal support and safety planning to victims of intimate partner violence and stalking. While Ms. Jackson’s matter did not involve her own abuse, she was sent there because the courthouse employee who referred her knew that someone with legal training needed to guide Ms. Jackson in some positive direction, and knew of no other resource to recommend to her.
The Safe Families Office attorneys are used to problem solving unusual concerns and make it their business to try to help each of the 2,500 annual visitors to that Office as possible. One of the attorneys present reviewed Ms. Jackson’s papers, discussed the status with her and called the Probate Court: the law clerk there discussed the process for the issuance of an Order to Attach, and Ms. Jackson was escorted to the second floor for assistance from that Court. (FYI, the Probate Court hosts another AVLF program, the Probate Information Center, where lawyers from the Atlanta Bar Association Estate Planning and Probate Section offer free thirty minute consultations every other week to those with questions about recently deceased relatives who have been screened by that Court.)
When the legally untrained walk into the Courthouse, many are immediately on the defensive- there may be no outright hostility to their presence, but there is also no real invitation. Almost every time I am in the Courthouse, because I am wearing a suit and tie and perhaps because I do not look intimidated, I am asked “Are you a lawyer? Could you help me?” We attorneys have so much information that is not generally known by people outside the fraternity, especially including the way the court’s systems work, and when time permits it is my and likely your pleasure to try to give people a push in the right direction. But how much better for all involved that there be specific places where lawyers work in the Courthouse for the very purpose of sharing helpful information!
It is not possible to overstate the value of the presence of lawyers in the Courthouse, those not there in the interest of their particular client but stationed in the building to address the range of the community’s questions about an array of specific substantive areas, those who can help Ms. Jackson go from weeping in the hallway to promoting the welfare of her child in a matter of moments. When the opportunity for you to volunteer in that capacity arises, please answer the call. You are a lawyer, and you can help.
No comments:
Post a Comment