Department officials on Wednesday announced a slew of initiatives, one of which is a pilot program in New Orleans and Baltimore that will pair law school domestic violence clinics with firms and legal aid organizations to provide pro bono representation of victims — a group that often goes without counsel.
The idea behind the Access for Justice for Domestic Violence Victims program is for law firms to hire recent law school graduates who have participated in a domestic violence clinic, then subsidize their full-time work at a legal aid organization for a certain period of time, said Tania Tetlow, the director of the Domestic Violence Clinic at Tulane University Law School in New Orleans.
