By Damon Venable and Bonnie Hoffman
Each April, criminal legal reform advocates recognize Second Chance Month, a time to reflect on the ways we can empower and uplift individuals who have encountered the criminal legal system. As a formerly incarcerated individual and a former public defender, we understand that to maintain an effective public defense function, the voices of justice-involved advocates must be heard.
While public defenders advocate for those accused, uplifting their voices, defendants, too, are advocates. In fact, the legal groundwork for our modern public defense system is rooted in the actions of a defendant who advocated for himself. In the summer of 1961, Clarence Earl Gideon stood before a judge in a courtroom in Florida facing trial on a burglary charge. He had no lawyer but knew he needed one to help present his case. When he asked the court to appoint one, the judge refused, citing the lack of legal requirement to do so. After representing himself unsuccessfully at trial, Gideon continued to advocate for himself and his case, petitioning the US Supreme Court. His personal efforts led to the landmark decision, Gideon v. Wainwright, which secured the right to counsel for all those facing felony charges.
For Damon, too, the advocacy journey is a personal one. At age 16, he was arrested for serious felonies, tried as an adult, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison. Even though, thanks to Gideon, he had counsel by his side, Damon faced many of the same challenges — a lack of meaningful way to be effectively heard in court. Due to his developmental differences of youth and his attorney’s professional and cultural distance from him as a Black juvenile from an impoverished community, his legal case was presented, but his voice was not heard.
Today we are seeing a new dawn in public defense, as defender organizations connect with the communities they are here to serve. Today, we celebrate the role of public defense to unmute the voices of marginalized communities, particularly Black communities, long silenced in American courtrooms. Public defense works best when it is reciprocal and symbiotic; with defenders present in the communities they serve, and communities present in defender offices.
Today Damon serves as a paralegal with a public defender’s office. As a system-impacted person who spent over three decades inside our prison industrial complex, his lived-experiences brings a needed perspective and voice to the work of his office. He serves as a bridge, connecting attorneys, clients, and community to one another, helping each to see and understand the other’s views and needs.
Having individuals like Damon as an integral part of the defense system makes the system stronger and unites clients, counsel, and community to speak as one voice in the fight for a more fair and humane legal system.
Damon Venable, a paralegal, writer, and social justice advocate, is a juvenile-lifer who served 35 years inside NJ prisons.
Bonnie Hoffman is the Senior Director of Public Defense at the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
