By: Zach Miller, Associate, Mountain View
Everyone takes their skills for granted at times - especially lawyers. We're surrounded by other lawyers and highly-skilled professionals, so it's easy to forget that our training and experience have provided us with abilities that other people lack - and yet may desperately need. Pro bono service can be a reminder that people outside of the legal and business communities value what we can do. And that can motivate us to put our skills to more diverse, inclusive, and transformative uses.
I remember the first time I volunteered with the housing eviction defense clinic at the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley. I doubted my ability to help anyone facing eviction. I had no experience beyond a couple hours' study beforehand! I waited in the lobby as anxiously as I imagined my clients would, holding their eviction papers in hand. How on earth could I be of any use?
I've since learned otherwise. At the clinic, volunteer lawyers help clients draft answers to complaints for unlawful detainer. It's not complex litigation - it's a matter of filling out forms. But for the clients, those forms are as daunting as just "filling out" a motion for summary judgment. Whether they know it or not, the volunteer lawyers - even if they have no experience with housing law - are skilled at assimilating relevant information, navigating rules and procedures, and paying attention to detail.
And that can make the difference between someone staying in their home or facing homelessness.
I've also volunteered with Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto, where I recently assisted a woman in answering a complaint for non-payment of debt. She spoke little English and did not know what the alleged debt was for. As we quickly discovered, she may have been a victim of identity theft. With the help of a Spanish-speaking volunteer, we drafted a form answer to a state court complaint neither of us had ever seen before.
No prior experience? Sure.
No skills? I don't think so.
Law is a strange profession. I remember realizing during law school that, as a future business litigator, my "clients" would largely be other lawyers working in-house. And as a young associate, there's even a feeling that my "clients" are partners and senior associates. When you're surrounded by people who are simply better at what you do than you are, it's easy to lose sight of your potential to contribute to the outside world. It's too easy to grow pessimistic. Pro bono has been a reminder to me that I've acquired useful skills and that we inhabit a world very much in need of them.
Zach Miller, a graduate of UCLA School of Law, is an associate in the Litigation practice group at Fenwick & West LLP. His practice is focused on resolving intellectual property, contractual, and employment disputes in the high technology and life science industries. Committed to pro bono, he has assisted the Animal Legal Defense Fund, the Law Foundation of Silicon Valley, and a local environmental nonprofit. As a law student, Zach served as an Employment Litigation Law Clerk for the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office. Before law school, he worked at a public policy organization where he advocated on behalf of Silicon Valley companies on issues ranging from cyber-security to health care reform. Zach is an avid hiker, backpacker, and backyard-gardener.
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Great article - definitely feel like that sometime surrounded by Stanford and Berkeley grads, even though I have 3 degrees myself and am building my book of business by the month
Posted by: Carlos Rosario | 06/10/2014 at 12:22 PM