The history of the American criminal legal system is marked by racial inequity. Across time and space, numerous racialized groups – from the Indigenous Tribes of North America to the well-documented high rate of imprisonment among Black people to prioritizing the prosecution of Latinx people in the U.S. and along the southern border – have been a focus of attention for the nation’s courts.

The Race in the Federal Criminal Court: Strategies in Pursuit of Justice conference is an inclusive program designed to share with everyone working pursuant to the Criminal Justice Act about the many ways race impacts the administration of justice and to provide them with strategies and innovation to combat racial injustice in the criminal legal system.

Areas to be addressed include strategies on litigating race from the police encounter on the street and the Fourth Amendment, roadmap for successful Batson challenges, practical tips in defending noncitizens, and ways to decrease racial disparities in detention hearings, charging, pleas, and at sentencing. In addition, sessions devoted to teaching a trauma-informed approach to interviewing, counseling, and other aspects of defender work,  exposing racial disparities in risk assessment tools, learning ways diverse teams can work cohesively and effectively, and several other sessions dealing with litigation, mitigation, and professional development will be presented in both plenary and breakout sessions.  We will also hear and learn directly from those who have experienced the unnecessary cruelty of the law firsthand.

This program is open to everyone working with federal defender and CJA panel attorneys. Yes, that means both attorneys and non-attorneys, investigators, paralegals, legal assistants, and any defense professional who will find the program’s content valuable to their work.  

The conference includes an optional visit to the Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum.

If you have questions about the content of this workshop, please contact Akin Adepoju at Akin_Adepoju@ao.uscourts.gov. 

Continuing Legal Education (CLE) accreditation for this program will be sought in all applicable jurisdictions. This program may satisfy CLE requirements in ethics, elimination of bias, inclusion and cultural competency, and professionalism.

This program is designed for those new to federal criminal defense practice and addresses topics such as discovery and motion practice, pleas and proffers, the Bail Reform Act, and the basics of the sentencing guidelines.

The Fundamentals of Federal Criminal Defense program is a 1 ½ day program, ending at noon on Friday, February 24, 2023. Fundamentals will occur concurrently with the Winning Strategies Seminar (a 2 1/2 day program), which runs from February 23-25, 2023, at the same hotel.   Fundamentals registrants are welcome and invited to stay over and attend the Winning Strategies Seminar. Separate registration is not required; however, when you register for Fundamentals, please answer “yes” to the registration question about whether you also plan to stay and attend Winning Strategies.  

Continuing Legal Education (CLE) accreditation for this workshop will be sought in all applicable jurisdictions. Limited financial assistance may be available to non-federal defender registrants for travel purposes. Financial assistance applications will be available when registration opens.

This program will cover the broad spectrum of issues specific to habeas corpus litigation on behalf of state and federal prisoners with noncapital cases. Plenary sessions will feature both national speakers and seasoned non-capital habeas attorneys, with breakout sessions for advanced and novice habeas practitioners. Sessions will include investigating and pleading claims, and habeas case updates from the circuits. Anticipated novice track topics include: introductions to timeliness; exhaustion, and procedural default. Anticipated advanced track topics include: interplay between 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2) and (e)(1) and real-case brainstorm session.  

Continuing Legal Education (CLE) accreditation for this program will be sought in all applicable jurisdictions. Additional CLE information will be available after the conclusion of this program.

Grit is a workshop designed by women and about women. For the first time Grit will take place in person! We will gather from March 9-11, 2023 in a very interactive format that involves live speakers, small group discussions, wellness offerings, self-assessment tools, and more.

Who may register?

We welcome all members of the legal team from federal defender offices or who are on CJA panels who seek community, growth, inspiration and time for reflection and goal setting. Our faculty is composed of legal assistants, paralegals, investigators, mitigation specialists, administrative officers, and lawyers.

Program description

Women in the indigent criminal defense field have many successes to celebrate and also face unique challenges. Participants in this small, women-focused program will find an active, collaborative, supportive community. This training will address a variety of topics as experienced by women including the journey to legal work, how to be a good mentor, improving communication in the office and in the courtroom, embracing strengths, identifying leadership goals, navigating relationships with colleagues and clients, building teams, understanding vicarious trauma, exploring work-life balance, and self-care practices and more.

Whether you are at the beginning of your work life or further along and hitting your stride, assuming leadership roles and maybe facing a roadblock, this workshop is for you. It is introspective, retrospective and prospective. By the end of this training, participants will appreciate anew how the community of women defense professionals is large and welcoming, fiercely committed to the mission and absolutely essential to the representation of indigent clients. Participants will set goals, learn strategies for handling challenges that arise, and strengthen a network of women colleagues upon whom they can depend.

If you have attended our virtual Grit, you are welcome to apply to attend the in-person Grit. Please note, however, that although we have added some new content, some speakers and presentations are the same as you will have experienced in the virtual programs.  

As with all DSOTD programs, there is no registration fee, and materials will be provided free of charge.

DSO Training Division will not be requesting CLE for the Grit Workshop nor collecting state bar numbers. However, we will issue a Certificate of Attendance to all confirmed attendees post-program. We encourage you to contact your state bar directly if you wish to seek a type of CLE credit for this program. Visit our CLE Information Center for your state bar’s CLE contact details.

For questions about the substance of the workshop, please contact Lisa Lunt at Lisa_Lunt@ao.uscourts.gov for questions about registration or other logistics, please contact Daniel Calderon at Daniel_Calderon@ao.uscourts.gov.

The Train the Trainers Workshop is designed to enhance training skills and expand the pool of experienced legal professionals available to serve as faculty at local legal education programs designed for CJA Panel Attorneys and Federal Defender Employees, and national Defender Services Office Training Division (DSO-TD) events. Participants will learn, discuss, and apply principles of adult learning, effective training design, small group facilitation skills, and interactive teaching techniques and methodologies. The workshop is open to CJA Panel Attorneys, Federal Defender Employees, and others who provide services under the Criminal Justice Act (CJA). All participants must bring a laptop with PowerPoint or another presentation software on it to the workshop. Two weeks prior to the workshop, each participant must submit a proposed topic they are interested in providing training on to fellow CJA practitioners. If you have done a training on this topic before, please provide a written description and outline of that training. Those who have not done training before but are interested in doing so are highly encouraged to apply. Registration is limited to 40 people. Limited financial assistance may be available to non-federal defender registrants for travel expenses. Early registration is encouraged.

This webinar will train you to keep your clients out of jail. Professor Siegler will also share the shocking results of her national investigation of federal pretrial detention, which reveals a crisis of epic proportions, with federal judges jailing our clients in violation of federal law, jailing clients for poverty, and even locking people in jail without lawyers. You will learn how to marshal the Bail Reform Act to combat those unlawful practices, reduce racial disparities, and win your clients’ release. The presentation (90 minutes) will be followed by a Q&A session (30 minutes).

Presenter:

Alison Siegler is the Founding Director of the Federal Criminal Justice Clinic (FCJC) at the University of Chicago Law School, the first legal clinic devoted to representing indigent clients charged with federal felonies, pursuing impact litigation in federal court, and engaging in systemic reform of the federal criminal system. Professor Siegler’s clinic recently published the first comprehensive national investigation of federal pretrial detention, Freedom Denied: How the Culture of Detention Created a Federal Jailing Crisis, which finds that federal judges routinely violate the Bail Reform Act and jail clients unlawfully. Professor Siegler has testified before Congress about the need for federal bond reform. She has also trained hundreds of federal magistrate judges, AFDs, and CJA lawyers on the Bail Reform Act. Professor Siegler’s clinic previously garnered national recognition for its contributions to groundbreaking federal race discrimination litigation in the “stash house” cases in Chicago. Before founding the FCJC, Professor Siegler served as a Staff Attorney with the Federal Defender Program in Chicago, a Prettyman Fellow at Georgetown University Law Center’s Criminal Justice Clinic, and a law clerk for U.S. District Judge Robert W. Gettleman in Chicago. She graduated magna cum laude from Yale College, earned

Continuing Legal Education (CLE) accreditation for this program will be sought in all applicable jurisdictions. Additional CLE information will be available after the conclusion of this program. For more information about CLE, please visit our CLE Information Center.