The Equal Justice Society signed on to an amicus brief by the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP opposing Alabama’s HB 56 law, the Beason-Hammon “Alabama Taxpayer and Citizen Protection Act.” The country’s most draconian anti-immigrant law, HN 56 will result in discrimination against lawful permanent residents and citizens of color. The brief was filed [...]
In August, the EJS legal team traveled to Montgomery, Alabama, the birthplace of the civil rights movement, where we met with death penalty litigators from around the country to identify strategies to overturn McCleskey v. Kemp, a 1987 Supreme Court case in which a habeas petitioner presented statistical evidence showing grave disparities in the imposition [...]
The Equal Justice Society welcomes Allison Elgart as our new Supervising Attorney, effective October 4. Allison was formerly an associate in the San Francisco office of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP where she primarily focused on consumer protection and employment class action litigation. “We are delighted that Allison is joining us here at EJS,” [...]
California State Senator Loni Hancock (D-Oakland) recently introduced Senate Bill (SB) 490, which seeks to abolish the death penalty in California. SB 490 will provide the voters a direct opportunity to end a broken method of punishment by abolishing the death penalty. This is the first time that the California Legislature has considered the issue [...]
The end of the Supreme Court’s 2010-2011 term was marked in part by a series of recent developments and revelations highlighting the dire state of the Supreme Court, an institution that should be a fair and impartial forum for justice. The Court has instead become increasingly damaged, especially with landmark decisions such as in Dukes [...]
Supporters of the Gulf Coast Civic Works Act (HR 2269) announced yesterday that a rally and press conference will be held at Noon on Friday, August 28, in front of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco office at the Phillip Burton Federal Building, 450 Golden Gate Avenue, on the plaza in front of the flag poles. [...]
EJS President Eva Paterson will participate in a press conference with other leaders and attorneys to be held immediately prior to Thursday’s California Supreme Court oral arguments in the Prop 8 legal challenge. Attorneys will argue that by taking away a right only from one group, Proposition 8 violates the most basic principle of our [...]
The Equal Justice Society is accepting applications for its 2009-2010 Judge Constance Baker Motley Fellowship, named after the first African-American woman to serve on the federal bench. Applicants for the one-year paid fellowship should be recent law school graduates with zero to five years of work experience after law school. The application deadline is December [...]