John Minor Wisdom Awards: 2009 Award Recipients

Lynn A. Girton

Lynn A. Girton is Chief Counsel of the Volunteer Lawyers Project of the Boston Bar Association. She has an undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan, a Masters Degree in Education from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and a law degree from Northeastern University School of Law.

Prior to her position with VLP, Lynn was the Senior Managing Attorney of the Employment Unit of Greater Boston Legal Services. She currently practices in the field of family law, as well as employment and unemployment matters, and civil rights. She has taught many courses and has published many articles.

Lynn was the recipient of the Massachusetts Bar Association Pro Bono Legal Services Award and has served on the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Appleseed Center, the community organization ROCC (Raising Our Children’s Children) and the Fair Employment Project. She also serves as a member of the Boston Bar Association Public Service Committee. Lynn was selected to be a mentor in the Leadership Institute sponsored by the Center for Legal Aid Education.

Kenneth J. Parsigian

Ken Parsigian is a partner in Goodwin Procter's Boston office, where he is the incoming Chair of the Pro Bono Committee and also the Chair of the Mass Torts/Products Liability Practice Group. Ken has been committed to fighting for civil rights since he spent five years before law school as a VISTA volunteer, working with inner city tenants and at a shelter for battered women. At Goodwin, Ken has run scores of pro bono cases, large and small, culminating last year in the successful release of an Ohio inmate who had been on death row for 22 years, and came within a few days of execution. Ken led a team of more than 50 Goodwin Procter lawyers, interns, and paralegals in a 16-year odyssey through the state and federal systems, including a trip to the U.S. Supreme Court, that culminated in the Sixth Circuit's ruling overturning the convictions, and the local prosecutor's decision not to retry the case. Ken has also been instrumental in assisting other lawyers handling wrongful conviction cases, including one that just led to the release of a 35 year old Missouri man who spent 16 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit.

Working with the lawyers from Gay & Lesbian Advocate & Defenders, Ken also played a leading role in convincing the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court to find that same sex couples have a constitutional right to marry and in fending off challenges to that ruling, both in the courts and the Legislature. Ken's current pro bono work includes working with the Youth Advocacy Project to protect the right of Massachusetts juveniles to have trained, court-appointed counsel in all detention hearings, representing women inmates in a class action against prison system for substandard treatment, and supervising teams of young lawyers in representing immigrants seeking political asylum in the U.S. to avoid persecution and torture in their native countries.

Leonard, Street and Deinard

Leonard, Street and Deinard is among Minnesota’s leading business and litigation law firms, with locations in Minneapolis, Mankato, and St. Cloud, Minnesota, and Washington, D.C. The firm was founded in 1922 and for eighty-seven years has demonstrated a commitment to pro bono legal services and community service.

Our Legal Clinic was established in 1993 in the economically distressed and underserved Phillips neighborhood near downtown Minneapolis. The Legal Clinic is a unique partnership with the Community-University Health Care Center, which is supported by the University of Minnesota. The Legal Clinic was created in the belief that the provision of adequate medical, dental and mental health care services to the disadvantaged is too often hampered by the many legal problems that accompany poverty. These problems relate to the need for adequate and safe housing, securing government benefits, addressing domestic violence and other acute family stresses, regularizing immigration status, and other legal needs.

This collaboration of law and medicine was one of the first in the country. Today, the integration of pro bono legal services with the provision of health care to the poor is the work of many partnerships throughout the nation. Although most of these partnerships involve legal services organizations, there is a small but growing cadre of private law firms partnering with a variety of health care organizations.

The firm’s pro bono services also include representation of individuals referred by area legal services groups and nonprofits. The firm cosponsors a two-year Equal Justice Works fellowship for a staff attorney with the Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis and provides a comprehensive scholarship and professional development program for minority scholars at all four Minnesota law schools.