Firm Overview

Examples of Garvey Schubert Barer pro bono legal work include:

Holocaust Ghetto Workers Reparations Project

On August 27, 2009, Garvey Schubert Barer was one of eight firms honored by Jewish Family Service of Seattle with an Outstanding Service Award in recognition of work for the Holocaust Ghetto Workers Reparations Project. Garvey Schubert Barer associate Michelle Rosenthal has joined with others in providing pro bono legal services for the Seattle branch of the project. In 2007 the German chancellor announced the creation of the Ghetto Work Payment Program, which offers a one-time payment of 2,000 Euro (approx. $2,600 USD) to Holocaust survivors who performed involuntary labor in Nazi-controlled ghettos during World War II. Approximately 60,000 survivors may be eligible for these payments. To help these survivors, Bet Tzedek Legal Services in Los Angeles collaborates with law firms across the nation to organize legal clinics and train volunteer lawyers to properly prepare the forms. As of August 2009, Seattle volunteer lawyers have helped over 40 survivors submit applications for reparations.

Representation of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Justice & Human Rights

Garvey Schubert Barer owner Harold G. Bailey, Jr. represented the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Justice & Human Rights on a pro bono basis. In a lawsuit we filed on behalf of the center, the court ordered the U.S. Department of the Treasury to release hundreds of documents about water and sanitation projects in Haiti. In ruling in the center’s favor, the court found the treasury had no legal basis under the Freedom of Information Act to withhold the documents, which showed the U.S. government’s role in stopping the projects. Garvey Schubert Barer continued working with the center to increase congressional awareness of Haiti’s need for safe drinking water. The center aims to fulfill the legacy of Robert F. Kennedy through promoting the full spectrum of human rights within the United States and throughout the world.

Representation of Guantánamo Prisoners

Garvey Schubert Barer owners Robert C. Weaver, Jr. and Samuel C. Kauffman of the Portland office and Eldon Greenberg of the Washington, D.C., office volunteered to represent two detainees at Guantánamo Bay. Since 2005, the three have devoted thousands of hours representing two men who have been held, without charge and virtually incommunicado, at the U.S. Naval Station Guantánamo Bay in Cuba. Subsequently, the firm has taken on representation of two additional Guantánamo Bay detainees.

In January 2002, the U.S. military began transferring prisoners captured in Afghanistan to hastily-built prison facilities at the U.S. Naval Station Guantánamo Bay in Cuba for interrogation. It was not until the summer of 2004 that the United States Supreme Court held that those prisoners were entitled to be represented by counsel in the federal courts of the United States, and that they were entitled to have their cases heard under the habeas corpus protections of the U.S. Constitution. Jurisdiction having been established, there was a critical need for attorneys to assist the prisoners. "We volunteered without thinking twice. The legal fiction that this administration has created to hold these men without due process should offend every lawyer in the United States," said Mr. Weaver. Added Mr. Kauffman, "When I was in law school, I would have never imagined that the U.S. government would imprison anyone indefinitely, without formal charges, let alone deny them access to a court of law. Now I represent two men being held at GITMO who have not been charged with a crime."

["Close Guantánamo" presented with permission of ACLU of Oregon and including interviews with Garvey Schubert Barer's Kauffman and Weaver]

Assistance to Childhaven

Owner Scott G. Warner and paralegal Julene Delo, of Garvey Schubert Barer's Seattle office, helped the nonprofit organization Childhaven develop a plan to protect its intellectual property (IP) and worked to educate them about the principles that govern IP. The firm's pro bono assistance focused on Childhaven's copyrights in the materials it created to train therapists who work with families that are at risk, the issues related to licensing those materials to others, the trademark rights Childhaven holds in their logo, and the obligation a trademark owner has to protect their mark from infringing uses.

Childhaven President Debra Ronnholm gave special commendations to Scott G. Warner and Julene Delo for their work. Childhaven's mission is to prevent and stop the cycle of abuse and neglect through scientifically supported programs that protect and treat children ages one month through five years and their families.

Grant County, Washington Agrees to Overhaul Public Defense System

In 2005, Garvey Schubert Barer's pro bono efforts, along with those of the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington, Columbia Legal Services and Perkins Coie LLP, helped clinch a victory against Grant County, Washington, as officials agreed to overhaul the county's system for providing legal defense to people charged with felonies who cannot afford an attorney. The Garvey Schubert Barer team was led by owner Donald B. Scaramastra and served as co-counsel for the plaintiffs.

Under the settlement, the county agreed to reduce excessive caseloads, guarantee that public defense lawyers are qualified to handle serious felony cases, and provide adequate funding for investigators and expert witnesses. The county agreed that its public defense system would comply with standards endorsed by the Washington State Bar Association and authorized by the Washington State Legislature. The parties selected a monitor to ensure compliance by the county during the six-year term of the agreement — the first time a county public defense system in Washington became subject to comprehensive monitoring.

"We are very pleased with the settlement, which requires the county to comply with state and national standards, provides for a monitor acceptable to the plaintiffs, and implements effective enforcement mechanisms," said Scaramastra. "This settlement should ensure that Grant County citizens who can't afford a qualified, committed, and effective lawyer get one."

Class Action on Behalf of Homeless Children

In 1997, the Washington State Supreme Court issued a favorable decision in a six-year class action lawsuit filed on behalf of homeless children in Washington State. Working as co-counsel with Columbia Legal Services (formerly Evergreen Legal Services), we persuaded the trial court and the Supreme Court that Washington's Department of Social and Health Services had a duty to implement a comprehensive plan for providing services to homeless children and to provide housing assistance in cases where homelessness was a primary factor in the decision to place or keep a child in foster care.