Washington Lawyer - January/February 2025 - 15

FEATURE
I made the decision early on ... that I would do public interest work. That's
what brought me to the Public Defender Service, and the more that I
worked there, the more I understood that that was really the way my career
was going to be shaped. I was there almost nine years, and I took one
year off to go teach at Georgetown in [its] criminal justice program.
I thought that going to Georgetown would give me an opportunity to
train and shape some minds before they go into the criminal justice field,
whether it be on the government or defense side. That didn't really make
a difference to me. What was important for me was that they understood
the importance of the work and the commitment that needed to be
made. I taught for a year, then went back to the Public Defender Service
as its deputy trial chief and did that for a couple more years and continued
to try cases.
Then, I thought that going into the academic world would be a good
move. It would allow me to pay a little more attention to the family because
when you do trial work, trial work does you. You just don't have a
lot of flexibility. So, I taught at what is now the David A. Clarke School of
Law [at the University of the District of Columbia] for four years, from
1993 to 1997. I joined [D.C. Superior] Court in 1997 as a hearing commissioner,
now called magistrate judge since the Family Court Act of 2002,
and look at us now. I'm sitting here, talking to you, 27 years later.
You have been involved in the establishment of numerous court
programs, including the Fathering Reentry Court. Tell us about it.
The Fathering Reentry Court came out of the idea that we could transform
the child support system. At the time, the child
support system was entirely focused on money, getting
the noncustodial parent to pay as much as they
could to the custodial parent. A noble goal, necessary
for raising children, but it was singularly focused.
When we started looking at Fathering Court in 2006,
there were roughly 77,000 cases in the system. We
went about trying to fundamentally transform the
focus of child support. It didn't mean that the money
wasn't important, or was less important; we just
broadened the scope.
We focused on returning citizens, men who were in
prison that we knew were coming home. We had a
list from the Bureau of Prisons, and we knew who
were going to be released in the next six months. We
could match that up with the individuals who had
child support obligations. For participants, we could
guarantee that [they] would get employment.
There were a couple of ways that we could do it.
Number one was the Department of Employment
Services (DOES), [which] had a program that was in
its infancy, Project Empowerment. It was designed, at
that point, to focus on returning citizens and people
in the criminal justice system. Their program was
subsidized employment, so they would place people
in jobs across the city - many of them government
jobs. The city paid a portion of that salary, creating
an incentive for employers to take those folks. So,
that's how we got people jobs initially.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2025 * WASHINGTON LAWYER 15
What we ran into later on was the discovery that, in most instances, the
employer would only offer the job as long as there was a subsidy. So, we
took some of our initial grant money and used it to [fund] a group that
was ... a job placement [service] for people who had a lot going on, like
people [with] a criminal history. We ran into this group (EDSI) when we
were up in Philadelphia looking at different models, and we hired them.
The Child Support Services Division of the D.C. Office of the Attorney
General is a partner in this and was fully engaged in Fathering Court.
They said, OK, this is important. We're just going to donate some space
to you in our building, which made it possible to have the services separate
from the court, but close by. We had case managers and collaborators
across the city that partnered with us. Organizations donated tickets
to local games to create opportunities for dads to engage with their kids
independently. We grew and learned many lessons, most importantly
that this program worked and we had very little recidivism. Very little.
It was a phenomenal experience - starting out with an idea and growing
it into something much bigger than we ever envisioned, despite
minimal resources, but through dedicated, [community-based] commitments
to these fathers and families. I consider Fathering Court to be an
example of how I approach leadership: identifying an opportunity, communicating
with impacted stakeholders and engaging resources, and
pressing forward together to achieve something, even in the face of
obstacles.
continued on page 28
"
Everything that
I've done as a professional,
and as a lawyer, has
touched this court in
one way or another ...
I couldn't be more
invested in this
place.
Washington Lawyer - January/February 2025

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