Last week, I attended a screening event at the Violet Crown for Simple As Water, a documentary that follows Syrian refugee families as they navigate the civil war in their home country: a mother of four in Greece who seeks to be reunited with her husband in Germany; a woman in Turkey who feels overwhelmed supporting her children as a single mother and contemplates putting her son in an orphanage; two brothers in the U.S. — and clients of Akin — pursuing asylum; and a mother still in Syria who tries to track down her son, captured by ISIS.
After the film, Akin’s Steve Schulman and his clients, Omar and Abed Sabha, as well as the documentary’s Oscar-winning director, Megan Mylan, told the audience more about the making of the film, provided updates and shared more about the purpose of their national screening tour: to raise funds for earthquake relief in Syria and Turkey and to keep the earthquake “in the conversation as it’s leaving the headlines,” Mylan said. (Visit simpleaswater.org for upcoming screening dates and links to specific foundations you can donate to).
Schulman, who lead’s Akin’s pro bono practice, said this spring marks the 25th anniversary of his first asylum case, which he volunteered to take during a litigation department meeting. At the time, he practiced antitrust and white-collar litigation at Latham & Watkins.
“I had no idea what I was doing,” Schulman told the crowd. He had never studied immigration law and the internet did not yet exist in the supplemental-knowledge role it plays today. “I didn’t know where the immigration court was — and I mean that in every way: not physically, not administratively.”
But once Schulman got his feet wet, he was hooked.
“Every asylum seeker has their own story. Omar and Abed are unique, but also have a lot in common with [other clients I’ve represented],” he said. “Once you represent a refugee and have that privilege, you can’t go back. It just switched me and I started to take on more cases.
Today, the Sabha brothers reside in Houston. Abed has been granted asylum, but Omar’s asylum case is still pending; he and Schulman have a big hearing later this year. Since the filming of the documentary, Omar has started a career in the tech industry, has gotten married and is now a father to three children. Abed, who came to the U.S. with his brother a decade ago after he lost his leg during a bombing attack in Syria, now studies kinesiology at Houston Community College. He hopes to attend PT school after he graduates.
“What keeps me going and doing [asylum work] is that it’s an opportunity to affect another life which, in a small way, changes the world,” Schulman said.
During the screening, I just so happened to sit next to Christy Jump, who heads civil litigation at the Muslim Legal Fund of America, a Richardson-based nonprofit focused on protecting Muslim Americans from constitutional injustices.
As we got to chatting, I learned about the various matters her department handles. Recent successes include getting 13 clients off the Department of Homeland Security’s “no-fly list” (including a 12-year-old boy and a grandmother with a brain tumor) and winning in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals for a Muslim-American family that the court acknowledged suffered “extensive and intrusive” screenings by government agents at domestic and international airports. Recently, the lawyers filed a U.S. Supreme Court petition for U.S. citizen Haisim Elsharkawi, who was wearing religious attire and was detained and handcuffed at LAX Airport for four hours, but never charged — missing his flight to Saudi Arabia for a religious pilgrimage he had been saving for.
Jump’s team has been growing. In February, Chelsea Glover joined as a senior staff attorney after spending several years practicing commercial litigation, antitrust and employment law at Carrington Coleman, and before that, at Gibson Dunn.
With Ramadan well underway, this month is MLFA’s biggest fundraising season. The nonprofit hopes to raise as much money as possible through the end of the month. To donate to the civil litigation team specifically, visit this link: https://support.mlfa.org/team/495812
In other news, details are below for two upcoming awards ceremonies that will both honor women lawyers — either for their work in women’s advocacy or for what they’ve achieved in their careers while paving the way for other women.
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More Public Service News
— The American Bar Association announced this week that it has named Sidley Austin partner Yvette Ostolaza of Dallas as one of the five recipients of the 2023 Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Award. The award was named after the first woman lawyer in America. According to the ABA Journal, Brent arrived in the colonies in 1638 and reportedly won all 124 court cases she was involved in over an eight-year span. The award goes to female lawyers who have excelled in their field and paved the way for other women. Ostolaza, who last year became the chair of Sidley’s management committee, is the first Latina and first Texan to lead a top 50 global corporate law firm (and one that is in the top 10 for revenues, according to the Texas Lawbook 50).
The other four recipients are Hawaii Supreme Court Justice Sabrina McKenna; NYU law professor Melissa Murray; Willig, Williams & Davidson managing partner Deborah Willig of Philadelphia; and assistant Watergate special prosecutor, former general counsel of the U.S. Army, author and MSNBC legal analyst Jill Wine-Banks, whose memoir, The Watergate Girl: My Fight for Truth and Justice Against a Criminal President will be adapted to film by Katie Holmes.
Ostolaza and the other recipients will be honored at the ABA’s annual meeting Aug. 6 in Denver at the Hyatt Regency Denver. Past honorees of the Brent award include U.S. Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sandra Day O’Connor.
— On June 21, Legal Aid of Northwest Texas is hosting its 23rd Annual Women’s Advocacy Awards at the Arts District Mansion in Dallas, where four Dallas lawyers and a local nonprofit will be honored for their work benefitting women and children through their sustained service and leadership. The Business Leadership Award will go to Sekou Lewis, the general counsel of the Dallas Mavericks. The nonprofit award will go to New Friends New Life, which supports trafficked and sexually abused teen girls, women and their children through access to education, job training, interim financial assistance and mental health/spiritual support. Jones Day partner Hilda Galvan is receiving the Champion of Justice Award, while Carrington Coleman managing partner Monica Latin will receive the Louise Raggio Women’s Legal Advocate Award.
Proceeds from the event will support LANWT, which provides free civil legal assistance to low-income people in North and West Texas, including low-income women and families seeking safety, security and lives free from domestic violence and abuse.
Sponsors so far include American Airlines, AT&T, Johnston Tobey Baruch, Locke Lord, Simon Greenstone Panatier, Lynn Pinker Hurst & Schwegmann, Hon. Carol Donovan, Kastl Law, Sally Crawford, Estes Thorne & Carr, Julie Ungerman and Sidney McClung.
To sponsor, click here. To donate or purchase a ticket, click here.