PBI's "Celebrating Pro Bono" Event Is June 5th
PBI will host its annual event "Celebrating Pro Bono" on Tuesday, June 5, 2007, from 5:30 until 8:00 p.m. in the Winter Garden Room at the Harold Washington Library. Please join your colleagues from law firms, corporate legal departments, and public interest law agencies to celebrate pro bono relationships and successes. The evening will include informal conversation, networking, appetizers and refreshments. Additional details are available on PBI's website, or you may contact PBI Director, Michael Bergmann at 312/832-5129.

David Askew Returns to Wildman Harrold as Director of Pro Bono and Community Service
As of last month, David Askew has returned to Wildman Harrold as the firm's Director of Pro Bono and Community Service. In this position, Askew is the first fully dedicated attorney to lead the firm's program. As Director, Askew will coordinate the delivery of the firm's free legal services to persons and entities of limited means and resources. He will also design and manage the firm's community service program that will allow attorneys and staff to volunteer their time and resources in non-legal capacities. Askew joins Wildman Harrold from the Illinois Attorney General's office where he served as Deputy Chief of the Civil Rights Bureau. Prior to joining the AG's office, he was an associate at Wildman Harrold from 2000-2003. Askew graduated from Florida A&M University cum laude with a bachelor's degree in Accounting in 1993. He received his law degree in 1996 from the University of Iowa Law School. Askew began his professional career in the Judge Advocate General's Corps of the United States Navy and continues to serve as a Lieutenant Commander in the Naval Reserve.

New Website Helps Attorneys Find and Do Pro Bono Work
Since 2002, thousands of Illinois lawyers and legal professionals who do pro bono legal work have turned to www.IllinoisProBono.org to help them find and do volunteer work. This month the website received a complete overhaul. On April 3rd, Illinois Legal Aid Online launched a newly redesigned and improved IllinoisProBono.org.

One of the most exciting new features is the Pro Bono Attorney of the Month highlighted on the homepage. Each month a short video shows off the exemplary pro bono work of an Illinois attorney. Please nominate a deserving pro bono attorney by e-mailing his/her name and a couple of sentences why he/she should be selected to Lisa Colpoys at lcolpoys@illinoislegalaid.org.

Other exciting new features that make finding and doing pro bono work easier include:

• Volunteer Opportunity Search - You can now more easily search for pro bono work based on a variety of factors, including who you are, location, type of opportunity, area of law, skills you would like to acquire, specific client type, and time availability. The search recommends pro bono work based on preferences selected when you registered. Registered users also receive email alerts for new opportunities that may be of interest to them.



• Legal Resources Library - Each time you log onto the new website it gets smarter, and delivers more relevant legal content, news and events to your homepage based on your usage history and identified preferences. Users can now sort legal resources in 24 areas of law by practice area or type of resource, so finding forms or video training presentations is much easier.



• My Favorites - For quick one-stop access, you can save links to favorite pages on www.IllinoisProBono.org and any other website.



• My Contacts - You can add contact information for colleagues and friends, which is then available from any web browser.



• Discussion Board/Email List - You can share information with colleagues about doing pro bono work and ask questions about your cases, either via the website or email.



• HotDocs® Automated Forms - Preparing documents for your pro bono cases is easier and faster when you use automated forms. All you do is fill in the correct information, and the document is created for you.



• My News - An enhanced news section allows you to get news from Illinois pro bono programs and national legal services organizations via RSS feeds. Registered users can also add their own RSS feeds, thereby integrating news from various sources into one webpage.

Attendees at the April 2007 PBI Pro Bono Forum

PBI Hosts 1st Semi-Annual Pro Bono Forum
On April 26, 2007, PBI hosted the first semi-annual PBI Pro Bono Forum. Over 70 pro bono leaders from law firms and corporations and representatives from legal aid and public interest law organizations attended the event. The Forum consisted of a panel program and breakout roundtable discussions focusing on issues affecting pro bono work. A complete agenda for the program is available on our website. The program is also available through Illinois Legal Aid Online as a webcast. Stay tuned for information about the next PBI Pro Bono Forum to be held in Fall 2007.

CBF Investing in Justice Campaign Raised $900,000 to Address Legal Aid Crisis
The Chicago Bar Foundation (CBF) has raised a remarkable $900,000 in its inaugural, three-week long fundraising effort, the "Investing in Justice Campaign," to help provide special grants to Chicago's legal aid attorneys and thereby help keep them in their critical posts.

"We estimate that this year's funding will increase the average salary of the City's legal aid attorneys by between eight and ten percent," said Jenner & Block Partner Anton R. Valukas, who chaired the 2007 Campaign. According to Mr. Valukas, the CBF and the Campaign leadership were able to bring Chicago's legal community together around this cause in a way that had never been done before, and the Campaign may serve as a model elsewhere in the country. A full list of law firm and company participants in the unique campaign is available on the CBF's website.

"We wanted to take ownership of this problem and send a clear signal to our colleagues in legal aid as well as the people of Chicago that the City's legal community cares," said CBF President, Kimball Anderson, a Partner at Winston & Strawn.

"By embracing this campaign, Chicago area lawyers helped to ensure that the most vulnerable members of our community will have the best legal advocates working for them," noted Mr. Valukas. Added Mr. Anderson: "By utilizing 100% of the campaign funds to address this fundamental need in our community's justice system, the CBF is making a substantial down payment towards the ultimate goal of bringing legal aid attorneys' salaries in line with comparable government service positions."

Save the Date for the CBF/CBA Pro Bono and Public Service Luncheon
The 9th Annual CBF/CBA Pro Bono and Public Service Luncheon will be held on July 9, 2007 from 11:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m. at the Renaissance Hotel. More information is available on the CBF website, or by calling Meredith Lovell at 312-554-1207.

Chicago Legal Aid and Public Interest Law Organizations Team on Appeal to Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals
The Public Interest Law Initiative, the Uptown People's Law Center, Chicago Legal Advocacy for Incarcerated Mothers, the John Howard Association of Illinois, the MacArthur Justice Center, and the Bluhm Legal Clinic of Northwestern University School of Law joined together to submit as amicus curiae in a case before the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. The Plaintiff-Appellant was a prisoner who filed a §1983 suit alleging that he was sexually assaulted by a prison guard. After being denied appointment of counsel, the Plaintiff-Appellant was forced to handle the jury trial by himself, which he lost. On appeal to the Seventh Circuit, a divided panel affirmed the district court's decision to deny counsel.

Amici sought to place this case-specifically the issue of when District Courts should recruit volunteer attorneys-into the larger context of the unique barriers prisoners face when attempting to proceed pro se and when they seek counsel in the private market. In addition, amici provided information regarding the availability of counsel to take on these cases, and the difficulties attorneys have in finding appropriate prison cases. Amici argued that the District Court judges should expand the number of cases for which they seek to recruit counsel, as these judges are uniquely situated to provide the missing link between prisoners who desperately need legal representation and attorneys who wish to take on such cases.

Read the entire Amicus Brief on the PBI website and contact Alan Mills at Uptown People's Law Center at alanmill@aol.com with any questions.

Conference Being Planned to Increase Pro Bono Outside of Cook County
The Illinois Coalition for Equal Justice is planning a pro bono conference to be held in Springfield. The conference will be held June 14-15, 2007, and will present an opportunity to assess and maximize resources for pro bono outside of Cook County. If you would like more information about this conference, contact ICEJ Director, Joe Dailing at 815/962-9050 or e-mail him at jdailing@icfej.org.

More About the Pro Bono Initiative and How to Get Involved
PBI is undertaking a variety of projects to achieve its goals. Learn more about these projects and how PBI Participants from law firms, corporate legal departments and legal aid and public interest law organizations can get involved with the work of PBI. Three teams, the Pro Bono Manual Team, PBI Program Planning Team and the Pro Bono Opportunities Team have already been launched. As the Teams complete their work, new teams will be added based on other projects PBI will be undertaking. Read more.

Past PBI E-newsletters Now Available Online
Did you miss a previous edition of the PBI e-newsletter? Past editions are now available on-line at the "News" page of the PBI website. Past PBI E-newsletters

Ida M. came to Chicago Volunteer Legal Services Foundation through the Chancery Court Access to Justice Program after her daughter had forged Ida's name on a deed and mortgaged the home they jointly owned. Volunteer Stephen Malato of Hinshaw & Culbertson not only successfully resolved Ida's case, he also managed to jump start a reconciliation with her daughter and, in the process, came across some useful news for other low-income clients.

Initially, Steve assumed the best he could do for Ida was to regain title to her half of the house. But, thanks to Steve's skill, negotiation and hard work, Ida recovered a $19,000 settlement from Chicago Title. In addition, Ida and her daughter agreed to sell the house, which satisfied the daughter's mortgage. The results left mother and daughter happy and on-track to a better relationship. In addition, while pouring over the client's records, Steve discovered that a People's Gas judgment, obtained against Ida in 1993, was still outstanding. He contacted Peoples Gas and found out that, as part of a settlement with the state, all debts previous to a 2005 cut-off were forgiven if the debts had been written off on Peoples Gas's books. Keep this information in mind if you have a client with an old, unpaid gas bill.

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In each edition, this section features stories written by pro bono attorneys about their pro bono experiences as well as perspectives from firms, corporations and legal aid agencies. Please consider submitting an article for an upcoming e-newsletter. Articles should be no more than 300 words and may be submitted electronically to mbergmann@pili-law.org.