This interactive timeline was created by the Alexander Campbell King Law Library. To explore more content from the University of Georgia School of Law Archives please visit our institutional repository at: https://digitalcommons.law.uga.edu
Legal aid by the University of Georgia Law students can find its origin as long ago and 1957 when a small group of students, in cooperation with attorneys of the local bar, began to furnish legal aid to the poor. This work continued in a similar manner in the civil side of the Legal Aid and Defender Society's work through 1967.
The Legal Aid & Defender Society dedicated to John F.T. Murray their first annual report. This was due to the fact that in 1964 Dean Cowen "appointed Professor John F.T. Murray to work with the Legal Aid Society and with the Athens bar in expanding the program to include legal aid for indigents accused of crimes. He sought foundation assistance to establish the program and finance it until its worth could be demonstrated."
In the fall of 1965 through a grant from the National Defender Project which had been provided with funds of the Ford Foundation to improve administration of criminal law and procedure throughout the nation, the University of Georgia Legal Aid Defender Society opened its first office in downtown Athens. The office operated by second and third year law students began its service to the indigent in the Athens-Clarke County area.
In 1966 the school applied for and received a grant from the National Defender Project (now known as the National Legal Aid & Defender Association) to operate the programs of the Legal Aid and Defender Society.
On January 1, 1967 for the first time a practicing attorney joined the University of Georgia School of Law faculty for the sole purpose of supervising the activities of the Legal Aid and Defender Society.
In 1968 a printed annual report was published for the Legal Aid and Defender Society. It included photos of students and faculty, a dedication to Jon F. T. Murray, and statements from Dean of the Law School Lindsey Cowen, Clarke County Superior Court Judge James Barrow, Legal Aid and Defender Society director Gary Blasingame and Legal Aid and Defender Society president Bill Goodman. It gave a brief history of the society and the evolution it had experienced up to that point in time.
In the fall of 1967 Judge James Barrow of the Superior Court of Clarke County under the Law School Legal Agency Act of 1967 certified seven students to act as counsel in court.
Robert Peckham became the director in September 1968 and in that year the Society handled 210 criminal cases and 170 civil cases.
Several photos appeared in that first annual report. Among them were images of students from the early days of the society, an office image of the first society's location, and photos of student officers and Blasingame leading them in a small classroom setting.
In 1970 the General Assembly voted to permit law students to assist district attorneys in the prosecution of cases and the Prosecution Clinic (now Prosecutorial Justice Program) 34 students were enrolled in the first year and it was the largest fo 10 such projects in the country. Professor Donald Eugene Wilkes!!!-gives us someone to get a quote from!!!! assumed the temporary directorship after the resignation of Charles T. Shean, clinic director during 71-72, who went on the become the assistant director of the Georgia District Attorneys Association.
In the spring of 1970, a faculty committee recommended the enlargement fo the Legal Aid and Defender Society and the creation of a prosecutorial unit. Both programs were electives and the faculty strongly recommended that the clinical experience be augmented by seminar sessions and substantive courses. Academic credit was awarded for the first time in 1970-71.
In fall of 1970 John T. Strauss joined the faculty as Clinic Director of a new Prosecutorial Clinic with 12 students.
Lindsey Cowen's deanship helped develop the earliest clinics. It saw the basic ingredients of a first-rate law school come together: new facilities, additional faculty, and new programs.
Robert Peckham developed the Georgia Prisoner Legal Counseling Project in 1972. One of the first of its kind in the nation, it was co-sponsored by UGA School of Law and the Georgia Department of Offender Rehabilitation. The project provided legal counseling services to inmates in each of Georgia's 40 penal institutions.
Robert D. Peckham in 1980 received the Charles L. Decker award for his work in developing programs to provide legal counseling to prison inmates. As director of the Athens Legal Aid and Defender Society he "demonstrated outstanding achievement in service to the country's courts, corrections departments and inmates."
The Georgia Advocate Placement Edition, Volume 19, Number 2 from the Summer of 1983 includes then student Alan Cook, noting his involvement with the Prosecutorial Clinic Program. Cook would go on to graduate the following spring and is now director of the same program since 2003 (now called the Prosecutorial Justice Program). Also included on page 8 is an entire section dedicated to Clinical Education Programs, with detailed descriptions.
In the Summer of 1984 a faculty photo was taken which was later printed in the Advocate alongside various faculty achievement blurbs. Included among the faculty of this particular photo were Robert Peckham, the Legal Aid Director, and Thomas Cook, the Prosecutorial Clinic Director. The original photo appears on page 19 of Volume 20.
This short piece appeared on page 26 of the Spring 1986 issue of the Advocate. It announced that Tom Cook after 13 years as director of the prosecutorial clinic was moving to private practice.
Peckham came to Georgia as director of the Legal Aid and Defender Society in 1968. He built the legal aid and prisoner counseling services into a model program emulated across the country. He also team taught the trial practice course as well as a course in military law. He retired on July 1, 1986. The announcement along with the photo shown here appeared in the Fall 1986 Advocate, Volume 22 on page 21.
In the Georgia State Bar Journal, Volume 26, No. 4 published in May 1990, Ron Ellington details the history of the University of Georgia School of Law from page 186 to 194.
A bulletin produced by the Admissions Office subtitled "Meeting the Demands of the 1990's".
Adrienne R. McFall directed the Legal Aid Clinic from 1991 to 1994. In a 1992 edition of the Advocate Magazine it was announced that the previous Legal Aid Clinic director Albert M. Pearson returned to full-time teaching and in his place Adrienne R. McFall was named director.
Among a selection of blurbs about faculty in Volume 28 of the Fall 1993 Advocate it is announced that Adrienne McFall will be the new director of Legal Aid.
In an interview with UGA Today in 2014 Laurie Fowler notes that she first "started teaching my practicum at the law school 20 years ago. We made it interdisciplinary in focus."
This short blurb appeared in Volume 29 of the Advocate on page 26 alongside several other short paragraphs in the "In Brief" section of the issue.
"I came to law school intending to be a criminal attorney so it worked out for me that clinical legal education at UGA back then was mostly criminal clinics. I took three semesters of the Criminal Defense Clinic (now the Criminal Defense Practicum) which at that time was run by the School of Law with a contract to be the public defender for the Western Judicial Circuit. My first semester was the summer following my 1L year...
The push to downsize and privatize has taken a toll at the University of Georgia School of Law: After 24 years of providing federally-mandated legal assistance to Georgia inmates, the Prisoner Legal Counseling Project (PLCP) has been terminated by the State Department of Corrections, and the Project's 26 employees have lost their jobs. PLCP Director Tom Killeen learned of the decision in a two-line fax informing him that Corrections Commissioner Wayne Garner had signed a contract with the Center for Prisoners' Legal Assistance effective April 1. The Center is a new for-profit organization run by two 1995 Emory law graduates. Killeen expressed concern about the level of experience and expertise of the new agency which will be handling the legal interests of the state's inmate population.
Both Russell Gabriel and Alex Scherr joined the University of Georgia School of Law faculty in 1996, announced with short bios and photos of each in Volume 31 of the Advocate. Each would go on to lead several clinical and experiential learning programs for more than 20 years to come. They are both still members of the faculty today.
Jessica L. Heywood graduated from the University of Georgia Law School in 1997. She is currently the Director of the Washington, D.C. Semester in Practice Program.
This book by Alexander Scherr updated the reference work on evidence law in Georgia, originally created by the late University of Georgia professor, Thomas Green. It was published by the Harrison Company and an excerpt is available in our repository with permission from Thomson Reuters.
This article shared stories of people helped by UGA Law School's clinical programs, gave a brief history of the program origins, and included photos and quotes from students in the programs at the time.
An offshoot of PIP is the Family Violence Clinic, which from humble beginnings has transformed into a civil clinic offering of its own. Founded by Christine Nalbone Scartz 0.0.'94), law students now respond to nearly 500 inquiries of domestic violence each year, helping abused spouses and children obtain civil protective orders.
"I had three clinical/experiential learning experiences during Law School – four semesters of Public Interest Practicum (PIP), one of Defender Clinic, and one of Capital Assistance Project. Although law school ultimately took me in a very different direction than I imagined coming in, those experiences were centering and kept me connected to my core public service values...
Georgia Law’s newest clinical learning opportunity for students, the Land Use Clinic, is making its presence known throughout the state. Since its start in August 2002, the clinic has helped local governments and nonprofit organizations negotiate the difficult path of creating development that is responsive to human and environmental needs.
This summer, a major newspaper publishing company reviewed Georgia’s indigent defense system and the school’s legal aid clinic came out on top. Attorney Stephen Bright of the Atlanta- based Southern Center for Human Rights, which helps represent the poor, said the Legal Aid and Defender Clinic is "as good as it gets" in Georgia. The clinic, which handles nearly 4,000 mis- demeanor and felony cases annually for Athens-Clarke and Oconee county defendants, was positioned as a model for other circuits to follow.
Under the headlines section of Spring/Summer 2003's Advocate is a short blurb noting that the then Land Use Clinic director Laurie Fowler being quoted in the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Today Fowler still leads the program which is now titled "Environmental Law Practicum".
After 30 years of advocacy and teaching in two Georgia Law clinical initiatives, the Prisoner Legal Counseling Project and the Legal Aid and Defender Clinic, Thomas J. Killeen Jr. (J.D.’74) retired to lead the newly created Western Circuit Public Defender Office, which began operation on January 1. Killeen joined the PLCP after graduating from law school. He directed the program from 1987 to 1996, when he joined the clinic. Although the law school will no longer administer indigent defense efforts for Athens-Clarke and Oconee counties, it will maintain an affiliation with the new public defender’s office. Russell C. Gabriel (J.D.’85), the director of the clinic since 1996, will continue to supervise the law school’s criminal defense clinic, and Georgia Law students will still earn academic credits by working with the attorneys in the Western Circuit Public Defender Office. - Portions of this story were taken in part from an article published in the Athens Banner-Herald
Georgia Law launches Mediation Practicum Earlier this academic year, the School of Law introduced a new skills-based course titled Mediation Practicum, which trains upper-level students to become Georgia court-related mediators.
In July 2006, the law school lost Col. Robert D. Peckham, former professor and director of the Legal Aid and Defender Society for more than 18 years. He was 81 years old. A longtime supporter of indigent defense, Peckham was highly involved in shaping the Legal Aid and Defender Society (which would later become the Legal Aid and Defender Clinic) once joining the Georgia Law faculty in 1968, a year after the society was established. He also taught courses in military law and criminal trial practice. While at the School of Law, Peckham was instrumental in the development of the Georgia Prisoner Legal Counseling Project, the first of its kind in the nation.
PIP partners with local service group to provide legal advice to artists T his spring, Georgia Law’s Public Interest Practicum began collaborating with a local service group, Nuçi’s Space, to bring free legal information to the music and arts communities. Working under legal supervision, law students are providing consultation and edu - cation to artists located in Athens-Clarke and Oconee counties who cannot afford an attorney. Clients can get consultation, advice and referrals about legal questions including those involving housing, families, consumer debt, benefits and health care. Inspired by Georgia Lawyers for the Arts, which provides advice and education to artists and art organizations throughout Georgia, this new service should complement those already available to artists and musicians
On page 18 of Volume 42 of the Advocate Fall 2007/Winter 2008 issue the 5th anniversary of the land use clinic was announced.
In this article written by Anne Marie Pippin in 2009 we get a description of the Land Use Clinic's purpose, contact information for the managing attorney, and an overview of the clinic's work in a survey of the local area.
Students at Georgia Law can now explore the practice of law from the perspective of an in-house counsel through the school’s newest service learning offering, the Corporate Counsel Externship. This course is designed to benefit not only students interested in an in-house career but also those who will work in law firms and deal with in-house counsels as their primary client contacts.
Georgia Law Criminal Defense Clinic Director Russell C. Gabriel (J.D.’85) was awarded a grant to investigate the financial burden of prosecution on indigent defendants in the criminal justice system even though they are represented by appointed counsel.
Georgia Law students are now working on cases in federal appeals courts as part of the school’s newest clinic, the Appellate Litigation Clinic. Its creation this past year brings the total number of service learning opportunities available to students to 12. Overseen by Associate Professor Erica J. Hashimoto, this clinic operates as a small appellate litigation firm with students accepting appointments from the U.S. Courts of Appeals and the Board of Immigration Appeals to represent indigent clients. They then work in teams to draft briefs and handle oral arguments when necessary. Hashimoto said the school started the clinic to give students the opportunity Litigation clinic creates new opportunities to gain experience in an appellate setting while helping clients who might not otherwise receive any legal counsel.
"I would highly recommend Mediation I and II with Professor Lanier to develop the essential skills that can help you elevate your legal career. From my experience, the practice of law has been more than applications of concepts I learned in law school class rooms. After all, facts of your case, your network, and your reputation will be built upon your interactions with your clients and colleagues. Professor Lanier's instructions in Mediation I and II helped me understand, develop, and practice communication skills that I use in my interactions with my clients and colleagues every day. These skills (e.g., listening carefully, reading body language, and sensing ambience of the conversation) developed through numerous mediations have helped me develop rapport in each interaction and ultimately lead me to my career in NYC. "
Students Crystal Johnson and James Rubinger present an argument with faculty member Peter Rutledge at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit before Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor for James Dunlap v. Cottman Transmission Systems.
Jason A. Cade is the Community Health Law Partnership (HeLP) Clinic director. In fall of 2015 the law school spotlighted this faculty member with several interview questions including questions about his goals related to the clinic and what he likes most about teaching in that setting.
This advocate article announced the Community Economic Development Clinic on page 16 (Volume 47, 2013).
This spotlight on Laurie Fowler of the School of Law's clinical faculty asks her questions and shares about her hopes for students in the classroom.
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