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Contact: Andrew Rush
Director,
Media Services & Public Affairs
arush@nysba.org
518-487-5530
January 31, 2008
DONNA LIEBERMAN RECEIVES NEW YORK STATE BAR
ASSOCIATION’S HAYWOOD BURNS AWARD
Executive Director of
NYCLU Recognized for Expanding the Civil Rights of All
People
Donna Lieberman, Executive Director
of the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), has been selected to
receive the 11th annual Haywood Burns
Memorial Award from the New York State Bar
Association.
The award, co-sponsored by the
Association’s Civil Rights Committee and the Committee on
Minorities in the Profession, will be presented on Thursday, January 31
at a reception during the State Bar’s Annual Meeting
in Manhattan.
“Donna Lieberman has
been an integral part of the success that the New York Civil Liberties
Union has had in expanding the scope and depth of its work,” said
Chair of the Civil Rights Committee Fernando A. Bohorquez, Jr., (Baker
Hostetler LLP). “Through her
dynamic leadership, the organization has aggressively pursued both
litigation and legislative advocacy in order to protect and enhance the
civil liberties and civil rights of all people. As a result, the NYCLU
is one of the state's leading voices for freedom, justice and equality,
advocating for those whose rights and liberties have been denied. Donna
is exactly the type of person who exemplifies the work Dean Burns did,
and what he stood for, and we are honored to giver her this year's
award.”
Prior to assuming the position of
Executive Director, Ms. Lieberman served the NYCLU as its Associate
Director, and founder/director of the organization’s Reproductive
Rights Project. She began her public interest legal career as a criminal
defense attorney in the South Bronx office
of the Legal Aid Society. She previously served as Executive Director of
the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, and has been a member of the
faculty of the Urban Studies Program at City College (New York).
Ms. Lieberman is a magna cum laude
graduate of Harvard Universityand earned her law degree (J.D.) form Rutgers University School
of Law.
The Haywood Burns Memorial Award
was created in 1998 and is presented annually to honor the late civil
rights lawyer and academic, Dean W. Haywood Burns. Throughout his
career, Burns used the legal system to address social injustice. He is
best known for his work with the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., and his
defense of Attica prison
rioters and black activist Angela Davis.
The Award, given by the New York State
Bar Association Committee on Civil Rights, is presented to an
individual, not necessarily a lawyer, who has contributed to New York
State in a manner that reflects and honors Dean Burns’ commitment
to the struggle for justice and the qualities that made him an
outstanding advocate for civil rights and the empowerment of the
powerless.
Previous award winners are: Judge
Cornelius V. Blackshear, of New York (LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae
LLP); Laurie M. Lambrix of Rochester (Monroe County Legal Assistance
Corporation); Leroy Wilson, Jr. of White Plains (Wilson Jacobson, P.C.);
Juan A. Figueroa of New York City (Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund);
Hon. Ellen M. Yacknin of Rochester (Rochester City Court); Rockwell J.
Chin of New York City (New York City Commission on Human Rights); Hon.
Pam Badoria Jackman Brown of Jamaica (Housing Part, New York City Civil
Court); Prof. Randolph M. Scott-McLaughlin of Pace University School of
Law; and John Boston, the director of the Prisoners’ Rights
Project.
The 74,000-member New York State
Bar Association is the official statewide organization of lawyers
in New Yorkand
the largest voluntary state bar association in the
nation.
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