Protesters joined at Foley Square in Manhattan to march over the Brooklyn Bridge in protest of the death of George Floyd on May 29, 2020. Photo: Ryland West/ALMThe death of George Floyd and the outpouring of anger across the country are prompting a range of responses across the bar, at Big Law firms and boutiques alike.
After Floyd’s death at the hands of the Minnesota police rekindled national outrage over police brutality and racial inequality, some lawyers are calling for larger actions among the profession to fight for change together.
Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison chairman Brad Karp said he wants to form “a consortium of leading law firms and public-interest organizations” across the U.S. for a major pro bono undertaking “to help achieve racial justice and eradicate systemic racism.”
Meanwhile, some firms have ramped up their pro bono representation of protesters. Midwest boutique Saeed & Little and its network of attorneys are representing 23 people in Chicago, 23 in Indianapolis and nine in Louisville, Kentucky. Some were arrested for shoplifting, others for throwing tear gas canisters back at the police. Many more were simply swept up in mass arrests, said boutique co-founder Jon Little.
On Saturday, Saeed & Little attorney Derrick Morgan Jr. sent out a tweet that has since been reshared more than 300,000 times: “If you’re arrested for protesting in Chicago, Indianapolis or Louisville, we will represent you pro-bono.”
Since sending the tweet, Little and his firm have received thousands of requests from the friends and families of protesters. So many, in fact, that the firm has relied on volunteer law students to call back and take down information. More than 67 attorneys—many civil and transactional lawyers—have contacted the boutique to help represent protesters.
Firmwide Efforts
Several law firm leaders in the last week sent out firmwide emails to attorneys and staff, expressing sorrow and encouraging honest talks between colleagues.
Gary Wingens, chairman at Lowenstein Sandler, told lawyers and staff in a firmwide email on Sunday, “Do not be afraid to have what may be considered uncomfortable conversations. … No one should feel that they need to make believe that ‘everything is okay.’”
Blank Rome in a statement said it was working with its affinity group, BR United, and its chief diversity and inclusion officer to create firm programming following the deaths of Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, who was killed by two white men in Georgia earlier this year.
Arent Fox chairman Mark Katz said the firm will establish its own task force to chart out how it can address police-community relations, racial injustice and violence.
“As lawyers and policy experts, we have a unique skillset to help bring about meaningful change. We can do that in the form of workshops, targeted community engagements, and engaging in legal actions through partnerships with civic organizations,” Katz said in a statement. “We will not stand on the sidelines.”
At Paul Weiss, Karp told lawyers and staff in an email Friday that “words feel increasingly hollow.” He continued: “It is not enough to care. It is time for engagement. It is time for action. It is time for accountability. It is time for justice.”
Karp said he intends to work with Paul Weiss partners Ted Wells, Jeh Johnson and Loretta Lynch, among others, “to develop an actionable plan to promote and secure racial justice in our country.”
Providing more details, he said in an email to Law.com on Monday that Paul Weiss intended to form strategic partnerships across the bar and the public-interest community “to effect meaningful and enduring change,” likening the coalition model to the firm’s efforts in relation to gun violence, family separation and economic effects from the pandemic.
Racial injustice, racially targeted policing practices and systemic racism is “too daunting, too sprawling, too embedded and too complex to be addressed” by a single law firm or public-interest organization, no matter how well-intentioned or well-resourced, he said.
Karp called on top U.S. law firms to work together and join forces to support work being done by public-interest groups such as the Legal Defense Fund, the ACLU, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Center for Constitutional Rights, among others, to focus on racially discriminatory policing policies and tactics.
Similarly, Sheila Boston, an Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer partner who was just elected president of the New York City Bar Association—the first woman of color in the role—said the legal profession “must rise up and lend our intellect, talent, creativity and problem-solving skills to solve this systemic and chronic injustice in our nation.”
“My heart is breaking for George Floyd and his family, and for all of us. Yet, I see glimmers of hope,” she said in a Monday statement. She added that civil rights leaders and lawyers are meeting, planning and mobilizing to implement legislative and policy changes, “for example, to ensure that citizens are protected from police officers who are unworthy of wearing a badge.”
Big firms are not voicing outrage without support from some in corporate America. A range of companies, including Amazon, Hulu, Marvel Entertainment, Netflix Inc., Nike Inc. and The Walt Disney Co., have issued statements aligning themselves with priorities of racial justice and the Black Lives Matter movement.
David Thomas in Chicago contributed to this report.
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‘Things Are Different Now’: General Counsel, Corporations React Publicly to George Floyd’s Death
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