Latham & Watkins Overcomes Significant Hurdles, Secures Asylum for Survivor of Gender-Based Violence

At this year’s Above & Beyond Awards, Sanctuary is honoring a team of attorneys from Latham & Watkins for their devoted representation in obtaining asylum status for a survivor of gender violence.

At this year’s Above & Beyond Awards, Sanctuary for Families is honoring a team of attorneys from Latham & Watkins for their devoted and compassionate pro bono representation in obtaining asylum status for “Leslie,” a woman who fled her home country in Central America after being subjected to persecution based on her gender and familial status. The team consisted of Latham partner Lilia Vazova, associates Daniel Grill and Emma Green, and former associates Abhinaya Swaminathan and Jaclyn Newman.

As a young woman, Leslie had been subjected to severe sexual violence and threats of harm by various male aggressors in her family, culminating in a horrific rape at the hands of her male cousins and their friends. Although Leslie attempted to pursue criminal charges against her aggressors and contacted law enforcement officers in multiple jurisdictions across her home country, her government failed to protect Leslie. Leslie lived in fear for her life and safety, and was forced to alter her lifestyle dramatically, including by relocating to another town. To hide from her aggressors, she stopped attending school and socializing with friends. Sadly, this was not enough, and her aggressors continued to harass and threaten her. Desperate to protect herself, Leslie entered the United States in early 2017 seeking asylum.

After crossing the border as a 20-year-old young woman, Leslie made multiple attempts to file an asylum application herself, but they were rejected for administrative errors. Leslie was eventually connected with Sanctuary for Families. However, by the time Leslie connected with Sanctuary, the one-year deadline for filing her asylum application had passed. After assisting Leslie with filing the initial application, Sanctuary knew it needed a strong litigation team to help secure asylum status. Latham generously agreed to assist Leslie in preparation for her asylum hearing on a pro bono basis.

Although Leslie originally filed her asylum application in March 2017, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, her hearing did not take place until August 2023. In preparation for the hearing, the Latham team worked tirelessly with Leslie and Sanctuary to prepare the strongest case. To obtain asylum status in the United States, one must demonstrate, amongst other things, a timely application or an excuse for the delay, that they suffered (or have a well-founded fear of suffering) persecution on account of certain enumerated protected grounds, such as religion, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion, and that they are unable safely to return to their home country.

Latham had to deal with several complicated issues: Leslie’s asylum application technically was not filed within the one-year deadline, and, because of the nature of her attack, it was challenging to show that Leslie had been persecuted on account of her status as a member of a protected group. Since her persecutors were not intimate partners, the team could not rely on the standard asylum arguments for survivors of domestic violence. They needed to advance a novel claim regarding the client’s eligibility for asylum. The team worked closely with the client and a country conditions expert to understand and present the reasons underlying her persecution.

Despite a language barrier, the Latham team was able to build a rapport with Leslie and provide her with a comfortable environment to discuss such severe and distressing events, including the reasons (which were out of her control) that her attackers may have believed her to be vulnerable and targeted her. The team came to learn that the sexual assault experienced by the client represented a horrifying pattern in which male members within the family deliberately subjected women and girls to acts of sexual violence as a means to control and dominate them. With this information, Latham spent countless hours with Leslie to draft her affidavit in support of her asylum application and prepare her to provide testimony at her hearing.

At Leslie’s first hearing date, the government took an aggressive position, forcing Leslie to recount traumatic events that had occurred almost ten years prior and questioning her credibility while recounting certain details of the events. The government’s cross-examination of Leslie took so long that trial needed to be adjourned to a second day.

Latham took this time to further prepare Leslie for round two and ensure that she would be comfortable sharing the details of her abuse on the stand. At the second hearing, Leslie was again faced with questions on the details of her attack, and she was able to answer all the government’s questions while projecting confidence and credibility, despite the sensitive nature of the events.

At the conclusion of the hearing, the Judge stated that she believed Leslie to be a credible witness and immediately granted her asylum application. Notably, the government deferred to the Judge’s ruling and did not appeal, which further evidenced the strength of Leslie’s request for asylum.

“Working with Sanctuary for Families and on behalf of Leslie has been among the most impactful experiences of my career to date. I want to thank everyone at Sanctuary and at Latham who contributed to this incredible result.” – Daniel Grill, Associate

“We are grateful for our multi-decade partnership with Sanctuary for Families, and proud to contribute to Sanctuary’s efforts to meet the needs of some of the most vulnerable members of our community,” said Laura Atkinson-Hope, Public Service Counsel and Director of Global Pro Bono at Latham. “We thank you for the award, but, more importantly, we wish to thank you for the work you do.”

Laura Atkinson-Hope
Public Service Counsel & Director of Global Pro Bono
Latham & Watkins

Pooja Asnani, of Sanctuary for Families, applauds the Latham team for their tireless advocacy on Leslie’s behalf and creative thinking in litigation strategy.

Join us at our Above & Beyond Awards Ceremony on October 8, 2024, as we honor Latham & Watkins’ outstanding pro bono work.

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Nicole Vescova is a partner in the Fort Lauderdale office of Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith LLP, where she specializes in representing management in labor and employment matters. She is a member of Sanctuary’s Pro Bono Council (“PBC”). 

Latham & Watkins Team Secure Clemency Grant for Incarcerated Survivor

At this year’s Above & Beyond Awards, Sanctuary will honor a Latham & Watkins team for their outstanding work securing a clemency grant for an incarcerated survivor.

At this year’s Above & Beyond Awards, Sanctuary for Families is thrilled to honor Latham & Watkins’ Melange Gavin, Wendy Gu, and Jamie Wine, and former Latham attorneys Brittany Ehardt and Jaclyn Newman, for their outstanding work securing a clemency grant for an incarcerated survivor of gender-based violence.

Last year, we shared on our blog that, after over 10 years of incarceration, domestic violence survivor Jacqueline Smalls had been granted clemency by Governor Kathy Hochul. Today, we are honored to highlight the Above & Beyond honorees who made this happen through their outstanding dedication, creative lawyering, and advocacy. Latham & Watkins associates Melange Gavin and Wendy Gu, and former associates Brittany Ehardt and Jaclyn Newman, with supervision and strategic guidance from partner Jamie Wine, worked with Jacqueline over a period of three years. During this time, they built a strong relationship with their client and worked tirelessly to advocate for her release, focusing on both a Domestic Violence Survivors’ Justice Act (DVSJA) resentencing motion and a clemency grant as possible pathways to her freedom.

Both options posed significant challenges: while a DVSJA motion would reduce Jacqueline’s sentence, resulting in her release for time served under the more favorable DVSJA sentencing guidelines, it would also have required a difficult and retraumatizing resentencing hearing. A clemency grant, meanwhile, relied entirely on the discretion of the governor’s office, and necessitated an enormous amount of work with no guarantee that it would result in success given the low numbers of clemency grants awarded each year. The team ultimately decided to pursue the clemency path anyway, knowing that if it were unsuccessful, they could pivot to a DVSJA motion down the line. As part of this process, the Latham team worked on a comprehensive clemency application that included a video of Jacqueline and other survivor clemency applicants, engaged in extensive legal advocacy, and met with the governor’s clemency bureau.

The case for Jacqueline’s release was extraordinarily compelling. During their two-year relationship, Jacqueline’s partner had subjected her to intense physical abuse—including strangulation, one of the highest lethality risk factors—and had been subsequently arrested several times. On the night of August 26, 2012, Jacqueline’s abuser entered her home in violation of two Orders of Protection that she had obtained against him. As her abuser moved to confront Jacqueline, she stabbed him once with a kitchen knife, killing him. Despite the obvious history of domestic violence, trauma, and clear danger to Jacqueline that evening, prosecutors charged her with second-degree murder. Jacqueline ultimately entered a guilty plea to a lesser charge of first-degree manslaughter and received a 15-year sentence. On December 21, 2022, Governor Hochul announced that she was granting clemency to Jaqueline, along with twelve others. Sanctuary and the Latham team were overjoyed with the news.

We are so thrilled to highlight the incredible work undertaken by Jaclyn, Melange, Wendy, Brittany, and Jamie. Thanks to their advocacy, Jacqueline was released and reunited with her family in January 2023. Staff members from Sanctuary were present alongside the Latham team to welcome Jacqueline home and join her and her family for Jacqueline’s first meal outside prison in over 10 years. It was truly incredible to witness firsthand the warmth and trust that had developed between the team and Jacqueline after their years of fighting together to correct this failure of our criminal legal system.

Director of the Incarcerated Gender Violence Survivors Initiative Ross Kramer said,

“The Latham team’s outstanding legal work made a life-changing impact in this case. They believed in Jacqueline from the start, and they delivered. Their representation gave Jacqueline years of her life back, to spend with family, friends, and community. This would not have happened without the Latham team’s advocacy, creativity, and dedication.”

Latham’s Public Service Counsel and Director of Global Pro Bono Laura Atkinson-Hope concluded,

“Securing clemency for Ms. Smalls was the result of tremendous dedication and tireless effort from the team as well as incredible strategic guidance from Sanctuary for Families. I am so proud of everyone involved in achieving this result, and so grateful for our longstanding partnership with Sanctuary.”

To read more about this incredible case, including our interview with the team, please see here.


Join us at our Above & Beyond Awards Ceremony on October 25, 2023, as we honor Latham & Watkins’ outstanding pro bono work.

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Romy Felsen-Parsons is the Pro Bono Project Assistant at Sanctuary for Families.