Litigation Assistance Partnership Helps with Complex Pro Bono Matters
Wednesday, September 14
- Organization: ABA Litigation Assistance Partnership Project
The Litigation Assistance Partnership Project (LAPP), a project of the American Bar Association Section of Litigation, is accepting referrals of significant, impact cases involving poverty law, civil rights, or civil liberties issues. LAPP works with law firms throughout the U.S. that are eager to take on these cases on a pro bono basis.
The ABA Section of Litigation created LAPP in 1989 to link pro bono resources of private firms with legal service and public interest programs across the country. LAPP's core function is to identify and place significant pro bono litigation with private law firms nationwide. These are major, complex and often time-consuming cases that require resources unavailable to public interest programs. LAPP works with programs and issues that involve subject areas not handled by other national public interest programs and clearinghouses. LAPP also serves rural programs without local pro bono resources for major litigation and finds out-of-state attorneys when necessary because of local limitations. LAPP is meant to complement, not replace, other pro bono resources. LAPP is a project of the Section's Pro Bono and Public Interest Practice Litigation Committee.
Examples of recent LAPP cases include:
Nationwide class action (filed in California) challenging the Department of Homeland Security’s failure to issue green cards to persons granted lawful permanent resident status in deportation proceedings.
Challenge to a private New Jersey adoption agency’s policy of denying adoptions to persons who are HIV+.
Medicaid benefits class action involving access to health care by low-income women in Massachusetts.
Challenge to redevelopment plans for public housing complex in Baltimore.
For more information about LAPP, including LAPP’s case acceptance guidelines and request for assistance forms, visit LAPP’s website at: http://www.abanet.org/litigation/lapp/. Please share this information with your colleagues in the legal services and public interest community.
To discuss a case or learn how your organization can participate in LAPP, contact:
Nina E. Vinik, Director
Litigation Assistance Partnership Project
ABA Section of Litigation
P.O. Box 7077
Evanston, Illinois 60204-7077
(847) 733-1855
(847) 733-1857 (fax)
