Theodore B. Olson and David Boies, co-chairs, Task Force on Preservation of the Justice System

“We all accept the premise that one branch can’t kill the other off,” said Covington & Burling LLP partner Thomas Barnett—but politicians, judges and lawyers at the American Bar Association’s Task Force on Preservation of the Justice System hearing cautioned that cuts to state court budgets are all but lethal.

The persistently lagging economy combined with meager tax receipts have left state and local government coffers depleted and every branch of government has to make due with less.  State judiciaries across the nation have been particularly hard hit.  South Carolina courts sustained deep cuts in fiscal years 2009-2010 that amounted to a 20 percent budget reduction, according to South Carolina State Rep. Jenny Horn.

William K. Weisenberg, co-vice chair, ABA Task Force on Preservation of the Justice System

Since its creation in 2010, the ABA task force has documented the withering of court budgets and identified consequences that limit access to, and the timeliness of, justice.  In Morrow County, Ohio, for example, a court announced that litigants must bring their own paper to court as there was no budget for basic office supplies.  More recently, California justices have warned that it may take up to five years to resolve a civil case.

Indiana Supreme Court Justice Frank Sullivan Jr. offered an explanation of why state legislatures are seemingly so willing to make reductions that impact the public.  Before Sullivan ruled from Indiana’s highest court, he served as the state budget director from 1989 through 1992.  In that time, the Indiana judiciary’s budget was not on his “radar” because it constituted an “infinitesimal” part of the total state budget.

Curtis Child, director of Governmental Affairs at the California Administrative Office of the Courts argued that the courts “need to be in throwing elbows” with their legislatures.  Child conceded that “the problem is, [judges] are not that great at that.”

Paul Dacier, executive vice president and general counsel at EMC Corp

Minnesota State Court Administrator Sue Dosal echoed Child’s call to action, saying courts “have to help the legislature do [its] job.”  Facing a 10 percent cut in 2009, Minnesota courts warned policymakers that a host of offenses would go unprosecuted without adequate resources.  Those offenses included misdemeanors like underage drinking and shoplifting, and even property disputes and small civil claims.  In the home of Mall of America, the prospect of shoplifters skulking with impunity mobilized the business community.  Dosal was resolute, “Adequately funding the judicial system is not an option, it’s an obligation.”

Others agreed the businesses need to weigh in.  Paul Dacier, executive vice president and general counsel of EMC Corp. related that in discussions with appropriators, arguments about the separation of powers and the independence of the judiciary often produces a “glassy-eyed look.”  Dacier argued that “we need more businesses and CEOs to raise that this is important to keep our competitive edge.”

Ohio state Sen. Keith Faber went so far as to call advocacy from the business community a “golden ticket.”

Task force co-chair Theodore B. Olson closed the hearing by saying that he felt significant progress had been made by the ABA group, but summed up the sense of most in the room by adding, “We are a long ways from the end of the line.”

See video to hear more from Boies and Olson on the court underfunding crisis.

The Standing Committee on Law and National Security sponsored the program, “Whither Cyberspace: Security, Privacy Rights, the Law and the Private Sector ,“ to discuss privacy issues and to understand cyber security in the 21^st century in light of recent government and private sector developments in new monitoring and security systems.

Panelists agreed that cyber security is a major challenge because corporations and individuals have not weighed the risks of an actual attack or how a security failure could affect their bottom line.

Baker said it is difficult to know how big the problem of security failures is because corporations generally withhold information about their computer systems being compromised.  Most businesses are either embarrassed or fear other companies will have a competitive advantage.

“Law firms are a prime target for cyber attacks,” added Baker.  A quick poll of the audience at the program revealed that nearly 100 percent of them believed that their law firm computer systems had been attacked.

Harriet P. Pearson, vice president, security counsel and chief privacy officer at IBM Corp., said that everyone needs to recognize there is an issue in securing information.  She suggests three starting points for any individual, firm or corporation:

• Risk Awareness: “Isolate your crown jewels or most sensitive matters and devote resources to protect them.”
• Ask yourself, “Do you have the right approach?  What is your plan if your system has been compromised?”)
• What is your plan of action to respond?

Vincent I. Polley, president of KnowConnect, PLCC, has been exploring security issues for nearly 20 years.  He said security concerns in a corporation have changed from employees making a mistake on the system or an insider threat, to corporations increasingly being vulnerable to advance persistent threats.  These are threats from groups or foreign governments designed to retrieve data for financial gain.

“The Sony attack may make it possible for people to understand there are dollars attached to risks,” said Judith Miller, former senior vice president and general counsel at Bechtel Group, Inc.

The Sony PlayStation hack, occurring in April 2011, is estimated at a $1.24 billion loss.

“No company can say ‘I can’t worry about losing money,’” Miller said.  “Because we don’t talk about this and prioritize the problem we have been stuck.”

“I had someone to say to me, ‘When you text, it’s gone.’  What?  You can’t count on communications disappearing,” Miller added.

When assessing an organization’s vulnerability, Baker said a good question to ask is, “Who is our adversary?”

Baker shared a scenario of a group capturing information to give to an opposing oil company in the hopes of outbidding the company on a contract.  Baker said, “There are sophisticated adversaries—you can’t afford that.”  He advised that a company decide what information it can’t afford to have in the hands of its adversary and to take precaution.

Panelists agreed that it may be difficult for small firms to incorporate technologies to ward off adversaries, but said that lawyers need to do all they can to help their corporate clients understand the risks.

Polley shared three tools that lawyers could use to help corporate clients:

• The book, Sailing in Dangerous Waters
• Study Sony’s $1.2 billion loss and the cost of other data breaches at the Ponemon Institute
• Securities and Exchange Commission (new disclosure requirements)

Harvey Rishikof, chair of the ABA Standing Committee on Law and National Security said ABA President-Elect Laurel Bellows has made cyber security one of her key focus areas.

Heidi Nesbitt, director of Pre-Law Summer Institute for American Indians and Alaskan Natives

When the Pre-Law Summer Institute for American Indians and Alaska Natives started in 1967, its leaders could only locate 25 Native American attorneys in the country.  “That was out of 560 tribes,” says Heidi Nesbitt, PLSI director and the American Indian Law Center’s assistant director.

Today, the estimates for Native American attorneys are from 2,500 to 3,000 attorneys and nearly 1,000 of them have gone through the summer institute aimed at preparing American Indian and Alaska Native students for the “rigors of law school” by simulating the first semester of law school.

Nesbitt received the 2012 Raymond Pace and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander Award Feb. 3 during the ABA Midyear Meeting in New Orleans.  She urged lawyers to continue to support programs like PLSI because they are vital to create a more diverse profession reflective of the nation.

Sarah E. Redfield, professor at University of New Hampshire School of Law, receives the 2012 Lifetime Achievement Award from Michelle Gallardo, chair of the ABA Council for Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Educational Pipeline

The award was conferred by the ABA Council for Racial & Ethnic Diversity in the Educational Pipeline and presented by the chair, Michelle Gallardo, who described PLSI’s nominating packet as the largest and most intriguing to read. “This program is part of history,” Gallardo said.

The Pre-Law Summer Institute, dubbed “boot camp,” by its former participants immerses undergraduate students in an eight-week program that teaches them how to conduct law school research, analysis, and how to write memorandums and briefs in addition to other case materials. “We teach skills that are required to study law,” Nesbitt added.

As a result, graduates of the program have gone on to graduate from the law schools at Harvard, Cornell, Stanford, among other prestigious institutions.  Alumni of the program include lawyers, judges, professors, deans and tribal chairs.

Click here for a video of Heidi Nesbitt’s comments.

As such, the panelists said, lawyers need to be aware of the concept and scope of ESI in order to represent their clients effectively and ethically.

What exactly is ESI? Anything that is stored in electronic form, including word processing documents, emails, text messages, Facebook pages, electronic photos, web pages, Internet activity and anything else that is produced and stored digitally, said John Simek, a computer forensics technologist from Fairfax, Va. Simek advises lawyers in the area and co-authored several related ABA books, including The Electronic Evidence and Discovery Handbook: Forms, Checklists and Guidelines.

According to course materials, one gigabyte of information (a basic iPad holds 16 gigabytes of storage) constitutes about 75,000 pages, or a full pick-up truck of documents.

So, when faced with a discovery request, lawyers from both sides of a dispute should consult as soon as possible to try to agree on limits of the amount of information to be sought and reviewed, lest the task gets unmanageable, said David Ries, a Pittsburgh lawyer who chairs his firm’s e-discovery and records management group.

David Degnan, a Scottsdale, Ariz., lawyer whose construction, insurance and government investigations practice often involves e-discovery and data management, added that it’s important for counsel to sample a large database to determine what’s truly relevant to the discovery request and, with agreement of the opposing party, narrow down the production accordingly.

Panelists pointed out that a crucial component of ESI is metadata, or “data about data.” Metadata—which has been called “the DNA of the electronic world”—is the identifying information that is imbedded in an electronic file such as a document, photo or email that isn’t readily visible but can still be accessed and be relevant to a case.

Ries said that metadata is therefore evidence and generally cannot be removed or altered when a client is facing or expects to face litigation.

Panelists discussed the seminal ruling in the Arizona case of Lake v. City of Phoenix, which held that the city was required to comply with an open records request by producing documents with the metadata intact.

ESI and ethics

While Simek, Ries and Degnan discussed client counseling and litigation aspects of ESI—including the value to organizations of consistent and clear records-retention policies—Muchman primarily covered the ethics aspects of handling ESI. She pointed out that lawyers have been disciplined for actions such as instructing a witness to delete incriminating photos on a client’s Facebook page.

Muchman also pointed out resources of the ABA Legal Technology Resource Center, including a list of state ethics opinions advising on how lawyers should handle metadata and avoid, among other things, violating client confidences by inadvertently releasing files with confidential metadata intact.

For more information about ESI, metadata and e-discovery, panelists recommended the online resources at craigball.com and The Sedona Conference.

With so much attention paid to the technological frontiers and related concerns of ESI, Simek said, lawyers still need to focus on another, old-fashioned form of documents.

“We still have to deal with paper on occasion as well,” he said. “I find a lot of cases where the attorneys get so fixated—everything electronic, everything electronic, that they forget that some things only exist in paper.”

Mark Moreau, co-executive director of Southeast Louisiana Legal Services, said that on the heels of previous funding cuts, legal assistance programs nationwide are being forced to lay off at least 10 percent of their attorneys on staff during this fiscal year alone. Moreau further suggested that the forecast for legal aid funding is going to get worse, adding, “Funding is always a problem in public service law.”

“We [legal aid providers] live year to year and that’s unfortunate because the strength of any public interest program is the stability of core staff, and when people have to worry about their jobs, it isn’t good for the system,” he continued.

In addition to warning of the realities in the field of public interest law, panelists shared tips to help prospective public interest attorneys find employment in the new practice environment.

Due to the increased competition for public interest jobs, Margaret Kuklewicz, an Equal Justice Works AmeriCorps legal fellow, Southeast Louisiana Legal Services, urged law students to get involved with legal aid organizations in their community early on in their education and to stay involved throughout law school.

“I knew from the beginning I needed to get into every public interest program my law school had to offer,” said Kuklewicz. “I knew that people needed to know me in order to get a job.”

Davida Finger, assistant clinical professor, Loyola University New Orleans College of Law, echoed Kuklewicz’s call for volunteerism.

“Volunteering at clinics is a meaningful way for law students to connect with public service work,” said Finger, who joined Loyola to work with what was formerly the Hurricane Katrina legal clinic and has worked extensively on disaster-related litigation and policy matters focusing on government accountability in rebuilding matters.

Finger also pointed out that volunteering can help people determine if they’re a right fit for the work.

Among other advice, Moreau suggested that there might be an opportunity for lawyers with a strong background in tax law to practice public interest law. “At a time where over half of legal services clients are working poor, a strong understanding in tax or welfare law is important,” he explained. Moreau, whose legal services program has a tax law project that saves their clients several million every year noted, “the movement has spread throughout legal aid and now more than half of programs in America do tax law.” Moreau elaborated these programs are “so important to so many clients who are working class poor.”

According to panelists, public interest law can be a welcome career change for some attorneys.

Jeff Yungman, director of Crisis Ministries’ Homeless Justice Project in South Carolina, decided to enroll in law school after being unsuccessful at recruiting lawyers to provide pro bono services for the residents of the Ministries. After more than 20 years in social work, he now provides civil legal services to homeless people in South Carolina—serving 483 people last year. “It’s a fun job, I love to do it, and I get satisfaction from helping people who are homeless,” he said.

When concerns were raised about starting salaries in public interest law, which re generally between $45,000 and $55,000, Finger said it is possible to live well and do public interest work. “You’re not going to get rich, but you can have everything you need to have a wonderful life and do what you want to do.”

The roundtable session was sponsored by the ABA Division for Public Services.

Robinson continued, “The act has ensured that legal and social services are available to survivors, and that law enforcement, prosecutors, judges, attorneys and advocates are well-trained and equipped with cutting-edge resources to effectively address these crimes in their own communities.”  Robinson also noted that the programs and policies brought about by the act are “credited with providing lifesaving assistance to hundreds of thousands of victims.”

Since VAWA’s enactment, the number of women killed by intimate partners has decreased by 35 percent since 1993, and nonfatal violent acts against women and men by intimate partners decreased by more than 50 percent, according to a Department of Justice report.  Other studies indicate that incidents of domestic and sexual violence tend to decrease when victims have legal representation and when they obtain protection orders.

Robinson cautioned that we as a nation have a long way to go, however, as nearly 1 in 5 women and 1 in 71 men have been raped at some time in their lives, according to a Centers for Disease Control study.

The ABA has long taken a leadership role in addressing domestic, sexual and stalking violence and recognizes the important role of the legal profession in addressing domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence and stalking crimes.  Since 1994, the ABA’s Commission on Domestic & Sexual Violence has worked to increase access to justice for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking by mobilizing the legal profession.

Enacted by Congress in 1994, VAWA was reauthorized in 2000 and again in 2005.  Robinson’s letter was sent prior to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s scheduled consideration of the bill.  The bill was reported out by the Judiciary Committee on Feb.2 by a vote of 10-8.

To read President Robinson’s letter click here.

In the AT&T case, AT&T sought to acquire T-Mobile, with the parties citing efficiencies in pursuing the merger.  The DOJ filed suit to block the merger; the companies also faced opposition from the FCC.  In United States v. H&R Block, the company looked to acquire 2SS Holdings, the maker of TaxAct software.  The DOJ tested its 2010 Merger Guidelines and challenged the merger.  Those two companies and Rival Intuit—producer of TurboTax—account for 90 percent of the market share.

The importance of market structure in merger challenges is critical, said panelist Chul Pak, of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati P.C., who previously served as assistant director of the Mergers IV Division at the FTC.  Pak outlined the courts reviewing the market numbers: “First the government must show that the merger would produce ‘a firm controlling an undue percentage share of the relevant market, and [would] result [] in a significant increase in the concentration of firms in that market,’” citing Philadelphia Nat’l Bank.

Recently, successful challenges have occurred in instances where, were the merger to occur, it would bring the players in the market from three down to two competitors, as in FTC v. CCC Holdings.  U.S. v. AT&T was more of a grey area in that regard, because it dealt with shifting the market from four players down to three.  By comparison, unsuccessful challenge examples are FTC v. Arch Coal—five firms to four; and U.S. v. Oracle, six to five players.

In reviewing whether mergers can go forward, market definition is pivotal, continued Pak.  Factors that the courts emphasize in analyzing market definition include business documents—both what is included in them and what is not; natural pricing experiments—for example, studying the possible differences between two firms and three players; expert economic analysis; as well as the judge’s personal experiences.  To the last point, Pak mentioned how a judge, when reviewing the Whole Foods merger case, went to the grocery store as part of the decision-making process and took a common-sense approach to the question at hand.

Panelist Matthew Hendrickson, of Skadden Arps and a partner in the firm’s antitrust practice, echoed the significance of company documents in these types of cases, as well as the scrutiny of economic experts.  Part of DOJ’s aggressiveness, he explained, can be seen through the department acting much faster than businesses are expecting.  Rather than trying to gather every piece of evidence having to do with everything, the department is more willing to rely on civil discovery.  In addition, the Department of Justice has been unmoved by lobbying efforts in support of the mergers, even though—as Hendrickson said—there was an extensive and vigorous campaign, for example, by members of Congress and state attorneys general in AT&T/T-Mobile.

Another facet of AT&T is the addition of private litigation in parallel to the action being taken by the DOJ.  The Sprint and Cellular South filing against AT&T/T-Mobile provided another layer to the process; AT&T soon filed a motion to dismiss.

Litigation is increasingly a tool being utilized by the government, continued Hendrickson.

Panelist Mark W. Nelson, of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton LLP, represented Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile in AT&T/T-Mobile.  Offering tips for antitrust lawyers and litigators, he said that the horizontal merger guidelines of August 2010 are allowing for broad discretion by the government, noting that they were extremely important in the H&R Block case.  He also observed the limitations of the efficiencies defense, as well as the dual-track DOJ and FCC merger review.

Jeffrey S. Jacobovitz, with McCarthy, Sweeney & Harkaway, moderated the CLE, sponsored by the ABA Section of Antitrust Law Communications & Digital Technology Industries Committee, State Enforcement Committee, Civil Practice and Procedure Committee, and the Center for CLE.

“Law firms transferring in attorneys from an overseas office can take advantage of the L-1 intra-company transfer visa,” explains Siskind.  These types of visas can be secured for five years for employees with specialized knowledge, or seven years for executives or managers.

One requirement for such a visa is that the transferring attorney must have one year of work within the last three years with the transferring employer.  The U.S. and foreign offices must also be related, for example, either as a subsidiary or having common ownership.

To meet the executive, managerial or specialized knowledge requirement, Siskind points out that a firm will want to show that the lawyer for whom it is applying for the visa will be managing paralegals and, where applicable, other attorneys; or in charge of a function as opposed to personnel.  Firms showing that there is no one in the local market with the necessary skills can meet the specialized knowledge threshold.

Visiting attorneys—those in the United States to attend a conference or to assist a client with negotiating a contract, for example—can come to the United States with a B-1 business visitor visa, continues Siskind.  The B-1 applicant must show permanent employment, meaningful or financial connections or close family ties, which would indicate a strong reason to return to his or her original country.

There are also treaty visas allowable for attorneys from specific countries; and a limited number of H-1B visas for university-educated professionals.

“The Globalization of American Law Firms: A Quick Guide to Attorney Immigration” is found in the January 2012 issue of LawPracticeToday, a publication of the Law Practice Management Section.

Peter J. Neeson

The American Bar Association Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section (TIPS) will honor Peter J. Neeson of Philadelphia with its James K. Carroll Leadership Award, which honors members who have shown outstanding leadership qualities and service to the section.

The award will be presented to Neeson Feb. 4 during the TIPS Joint Reception with the International Law Section and Judicial Division of the 2012 ABA Midyear Meeting.

“TIPS is honored to present Peter Neeson with its James K. Carroll Leadership Award,” said section chair Randy Aliment of Seattle. “Peter has shown outstanding leadership of and service to the section over many years.  Peter served as chair of the section and developed several unique and top-notch programs for TIPS members including the National Trial Academy and Leadership Academy. These are just a few of the valuable contributions he’s made to TIPS.”

Neeson is a partner with Rawle & Henderson LLP in Philadelphia, where he serves as chair of its Environmental, Toxic and Mass Torts Department. As a practicing trial attorney for 33 years, Neeson has been involved in the defense of numerous toxic tort matters in multi-district and class action cases in both state and federal courts, including formaldehyde, multiple chemical sensitivity, sick building, latex glove, benzene, underground storage tank, orthopedic bone screw, pharmaceutical and asbestos litigation including the defense of over 3,000 such cases against a major manufacturer. He has also participated in the defense of several generators in CERCLA superfund cases.  Neeson has been the national coordinating counsel for a major insurance carrier in the FRT litigation and has had national coordinator responsibilities in the asbestos, latex glove and the PPA pharmaceutical drug litigations.

Neeson has shown longtime support of and leadership within TIPS, having served as chair in 2006, chair-elect in 2005 and vice-chair in 2004. He also served as chair of the section’s Products, General Liability and Consumer Law Committee, served on the section’s council and spearheaded the development of the National Trial Academy in conjunction with the National Judicial College in Reno, Nev., which is widely recognized as the premier forum of its kind in which to train young lawyers how to try jury trials.

Neeson also founded the TIPS Leadership Academy, a diversity program designed to develop and train future community and bar leaders.

In addition to his ABA involvement, Neeson is a member of the Defense Research Institute, the Pennsylvania Defense Institute and a past member of the executive committee of the Philadelphia Association of the Defense Counsel.

Neeson earned his B.S. in Aero Space Mechanical Engineering from the University of Notre Dame in 1970 and his J.D. from the University of Miami (cum laude) in 1978.  He is admitted to practice in Pennsylvania and New York.

Neeson has been rated AV by Martindale-Hubbell and was individually honored when he was selected by his peers in an extensive nomination and polling process conducted by Law & Politics as one of Pennsylvania’s Super Lawyers from 2004 through 2011.

He has also authored/edited various publications including his efforts as the editor and co-author of a 1995 ABA-TIPS book entitled the Reference Handbook on the Comprehensive General Liability Policy.

Neeson has served in other various leadership roles including vice chairman of the U.S. Olympic Committee for Eastern Pennsylvania, current member of the board of directors of the Philadelphia Sports Congress, the city’s civic/business facilitator for the promotion and development of sporting events in the city, past president of the Philadelphia Amateur Sports Corporation, general counsel and a member of the Executive Committee for Philadelphia Women’s Basketball 2000, the local organizing committee for the NCAA Women’s Final Four basketball tournament and an Executive Committee Member for the 2003 U.S.G.A. Women’s Amateur Golf Championship held in Philadelphia.

More recently, he has been asked to serve as general counsel and chair of the board of the Biotech Foundation, an innovator of new vaccine and biofuels technology and as general counsel and a member of the board of trustees of Philadelphia 2016, Philadelphia’s effort to bid for the summer 2016 Olympics.

The ABA Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section unites plaintiff, defense, insurance, and corporate counsel to advance the civil justice system.  TIPS is a national source of expertise in tort, trial and insurance practice and brings lawyers together to share information and speak out on issues of importance.  The section has about 25,000 members and 32 general committees that focus on substantive and procedural matters in areas across the broad spectrum of civil law and practice.  For more information about the Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section visit the TIPS website, www.americanbar.org/tips.

With nearly 400,000 members, the American Bar Association is the world’s largest voluntary professional membership organization. As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.

(L - R) Maria Woltjen, director and founder, Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights at the University of Chicago; Lynne Johnson, policy and advocacy director, Chicago Alliance Agaisnt Sexual Exploitation; Rachel Durchslag, founder and executive director, CAASE; Tianne Bataille, chair, anti-trafficking initiative, Legal Aid Society of Metropolitan Family Services; Jennifer Greene, violence against women policy advisor, Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office (photo by Kristin Claes, CAASE)

Cook County, Ill., State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez has made human trafficking a priority. At a recent program in Chicago sponsored by the International Human Rights Committee of the American Bar Association Section of International Law, she told the audience made up of representatives from law enforcement, social service agencies and advocacy groups that Chicago has become a crossroads for commercial sexual exploitation.

“Sex Trafficking from the Boardroom to the Classroom:  Prevention, Intervention & Prosecution” was the third program in a series that highlights the growing international problem of human trafficking—an issue that is reverberating in local communities across the country.

Yet, as Alvarez noted, “Most average citizens do not realize that it is happening here.”

To help raise awareness as well as to address the problem, Alvarez created a special unit within the organized crime division that focuses on intervention and prevention—with special attention to help victims of the crime.

Among its work, the unit has been aggressive in enforcing the Illinois Safe Children’s Act, which Alvarez said is one of the most comprehensive and sweeping pieces of legislation in this country to deal with trafficking.

The law—which has brought charges for 48 people in Cook County in less than two years—is particularly noteworthy because it places emphasis on nabbing the pimps who put some 6,000 children to work as prostitutes on the streets each year.

“No one’s going to tell me that a 10-, 11-, 12-year old girl is out there prostituting herself,” said Alvarez, underscoring the importance of decriminalizing underage prostitution.  “We know that she’s put out on the street by someone who is making money of this and victimizing her.”

Jennifer Greene, policy advisor on violence against women issues for Alvarez’s office, said the human trafficking initiative’s emphasis on victims’ concerns has made it a national model.

Addressing demand in the main concern for representatives of the Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation, who also spoke at the program.  CAASE’s mission is unique in that it focuses on “individuals that perpetrate, profit from, or support sexual exploitation.”  The organization created the End Demand Illinois campaign to shift law enforcement’s attention to sex traffickers and people who buy sex, while creating a network of support for sex trade survivors.

To facilitate the efforts of CAASE and others, the Illinois Predator Accountability Act permits victims to sue their pimps or customers. But since no law suit has ever been brought under the law that was passed in 2006, the Legal Aid Society of Metropolitan Family Services is looking for volunteers.  Board member and international lawyer Tianne Bataille said, “We don’t know what the challenges are going to bring.  We fear organized crime could have huge budgets for defendants.”

Bataille estimates that traffickers earn between $250,000 and $500,000 per year, before taxes.  “That provides enormous incentive for behavior to continue,” she said.

Building awareness of the problem is key to finding solutions, and CAASE is going into schools to educate students on the ills that trafficking creates. CAASE recently launched “Empowering Young Men to End Sexual Exploitation,” a curriculum aimed at high school-aged boys. Rachel Durchslag, founder and executive director of CAASE, said the program is designed to teach them about the harms of prostitution and to enlist them as allies in the movement to end violence against women and girls.

Joining the program via videoconference was Gunilla Eckberg, a Swedish-Canadian lawyer and former advisor on trafficking to the Swedish government, where prostitution is officially recognized as a form of male sexual violence against women and children.  “We know from international experience that when you target the demand, you will have a very visible and immediate effect on the number of victims of trafficking,” she said.

Maria Woltjen, director and founder, Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights at the University of Chicago, served as moderator for the program.

The fourth program in the series, “Not for Sale: Global Responses to Sex and Labor Trafficking” will be held April 19, 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. during the Section of International Law 2012 Spring Meeting in New York City.  For more information, click here.