Meagan Tousley (2L)
Death Penalty Litigation Clinic
8th Circuit States/Midwest
Meagan will be working at the Death Penalty Litigation Clinic in Kansas City, Missouri. The Death Penalty Litigation Clinic (DPLC) represents individuals and offers support to defense attorneys representing individuals who are sentenced to death row. They specialize in post-conviction defense and mitigation investigation, and pre-authorization mitigation investigation, and well as clemency.
Meagan will be working mostly on a class action against the US government involving international law. It deals with the Vienna Convention of Consular Rights. The case has a trial date set for December 2011. She will have the opportunity to file motions and partake in pre-trial hearings. She will be working exclusively with Jennifer Merrigan, the acting director for DPLC. She will be able to utilize her international law skills and procedural knowledge to prepare the case for trial. She will also be given the opportunity to travel throughout the 8th circuit to attend seminars and workshops to further her death penalty education.
August 1, 2011
At the Death Penalty Litigation Clinic I have focused my time on the issue of whether or not an individual right was created by Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. This issue has come up recently in the news in a recent death penalty case in Texas, Humberto Leal Garcia. This case is related because Leal Garcia was a foreign national who was not advised of his right to contact his consulate after being arrested. Without the help of his consulate, crucial mitigating evidence was left out of his sentencing hearing. Leal Garcia was included in a class action suit against the US at the International Court of Justice (Mexico v. US) where the US was ordered to review and reconsider the cases of all foreign nationals who were not advised of consular rights.
This case was very interesting to my research because it relied mainly on pending legislation in Congress that would implement the ICJ judgment and would require the US to give new hearings to those who lacked consular notice, including our client. However, the US Supreme Court was not convinced by the pending legislation stating that until it passed, there was nothing they would do.
I have also had the opportunity to hear from guest speakers about death penalty law. For example, I heard from Sean O'Brian, the founder of the clinic and a professor at University of Kansas City, MO. He talked about his experience with an overturned conviction emphasizing the importance of details and how crucial investigation was to this kind of work.
I also heard from Renee Boman, a field organizer from Kansas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. She has managed to form alliances with law enforcement in Kansas and Missouri who oppose the death penalty. This was interesting to see a different side of advocacy work. Finally, I got to celebrate with Tom White, a man wrongfully convicted who, seven years later, received a $16 million judgment against the city who wrongfully convicted him. It was encouraging seeing that justice was finally done, but frustrating to see the length of time it took to reach that point.
June 27, 2011
While working at the Death Penalty Litigation Clinic I have had the opportunity to take part in a research survey in hopes to reveal racial biases in capital case determination. I have been researching statistical information on all criminal convictions occurring in both St. Louis County and St. Louis City between 1998 and 2008. We have been looking at all convictions involving murder 1, murder 2, and voluntary manslaughter. What we are looking for is any consistencies or patterns that may arise in a prosecutor's decision to choose the death penalty such as race, aggravating factors, location, presiding judge, acting prosecutor, defense attorneys, etc. A similar survey was recently published in North Carolina that resulted in new legislation called the Racial Justice Act. The legislation allows all prisoners who fit within the constraints of the survey to have a new hearing with no procedural bars to determine if their case was a product of racial discrimination.
I am also working on a § 2255 habeas corpus petition of a Canadian national who was sentenced to death in St. Louis. I am focusing on the Vienna Convention of Consular Rights violation claim. The government never advised our client of his consular rights and is in violation of article 36 of the Vienna Convention. My research focuses on the strength of this claim surviving and what would happen if it were discovered that our client is a dual national of Canada and the United States. Currently the petition was filed in December and we are waiting for the government's reply after a 6-month extension was granted.
I have also had the opportunity while working here to go to Missouri death row and visit other clients of the clinic. Also weekly, the clinic has guest speakers come in such as Cyndy Short. She has represented over 75 clients facing the death penalty, including trying 26 capital cases, and not one of her clients has been sentenced to death. This week we will hear from Darryl Burton who has recently been exonerated from death row for a wrongful conviction after 24 years of incarceration.
Read Meagan's journal from last year's internship:
Meagan Tousley (1L)
Legal Aid South Africa
Johannesburg, South Africa
(2010 PILF internship)
Meagan will be working at the Legal Aid South Africa Development office in Johannesburg, South Africa. Legal Aid SA is the largest state funded legal representation service throughout South Africa. Meagan will be focusing on searching for issues to bring before the Constitutional Court. This work entails researching topics and organizing clients who can bring the issue forward. She will also be assisting at the Law Clinic at the Mandela Institute at Witwatersrand University, Johannesburg. At the Law Clinic, she will meet with clients, conduct initial intakes, and legal consultations. This experience will prove to be invaluable, as she will have the opportunity to work one on one with clients, as well as participate in emerging constitutional issues. She will have the ability to use her multi-language skills as South Africa alone has 11 official languages, alongside with the high percentage of refugees from surrounding African countries like Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and Democratic Republic of Congo. Meagan will have the opportunity to work with top attorneys of Legal Aid of South Africa; sharpen her research, communication, and interpersonal skills; and to work in a country with a newly adopted constitution that is still shaping itself. Since Legal Aid has such a wide range of clients and issues they deal with, Meagan will be exposed to civil, criminal, and constitutional law at an international level.
August 2010
This month I have been busy tying up loose ends. First in following up with the glue-sniffers case; our strategy has been to find an organization that would represent the glue-sniffing children in a class action. The action would be against the Government in efforts to change legislation. We would like to make it illegal to produce the addictive component in shoe glue that children use to get high. Currently, safe alternatives exist that would not be addicting, but would be more costly to the producer.
I found another organization closer to our headquarters to work with, in hopes to use as a representative for all the children affected by sniffing glue. The director agreed to meet with us to discuss the possibilities of interviewing some children, and taking affidavits from outreach workers who were directly involved with the glue-sniffing children. The meeting was very informative for both the organization and the Legal Aid South Africa crew; however, at the end the organization was reluctant to involve the children in such a lengthy legal process. They decided to talk it over amongst themselves and meet sometime again in August to discuss the matter further.
I also had the opportunity to visit one of the justice centers of Legal Aid South Africa in a township called Alexander. This is considered one of the worst townships in Johannesburg in terms of crime and violence. A justice center is a place where individuals can consult one on one with lawyers and apply for legal aid. Not only did we visit the justice center, but the court as well. After spending a great deal of time with the prosecutor discussing the root causes of crime in Alexander, it was apparent that the main cause of the crime was lack of housing and corruption among government officials. In the South African Constitution, every citizen has a right to housing. There are vast numbers of citizens who live on the streets and await their government issued house. However, some people have been on the waiting list for over 40 years, while others only have to wait a few weeks. There are other instances where 4 (or sometimes even more) people are issued permits as the lawful owners of the same property, again causing further confusion and frustration. Thus far, all suggestions have made little improvement in mending the housing problem.
As my days here at Legal Aid South Africa are coming to an end, I am left with many projects that will always be in the back of my mind waiting for creative solutions. A lot of the issues I have dealt with are problems that exist not only in South Africa, but worldwide as well. I have learned how to approach an immense problem and break it down into something manageable. I have learned about how the process of bringing a class action works, and the steps and hurdles that need to be done to realize results. I have learned that law is not just about following a set of rules, but that creativity can still be crucial to finding solutions to unsolved issues. I have also learned the difficulty in working with other organizations as well as some of the problems that will arise when bringing forward a human rights issue. I am reassured everyday that this experience has proven to be invaluable to me as it has given me many tools that I will use again throughout my legal career.
June 2010
Our office is the development office and deals with the distribution of funds for different cases to be brought before the Constitutional Court.
My first day, I sat down with an attorney and discussed the problem of glue sniffing among street children in Johannesburg. This problem occurs about 5 blocks from where my office is located. My assignment? To find a local NGO to work with our office and help file a class action law suit against the government, the vendors who sell glue to minors, and the glue manufacturers who refuse to replace the highly addictive chemical in the glue.
I left her office thinking, this is going to be a piece of cake. In South Africa, there are a lot of untrustworthy organizations out there, and besides that, a lot of the organizations cannot afford a phone or even to maintain their website. Thus, the simple task of finding a local NGO to work with turned into an extensive task. I ended up contacting international NGOs that worked with glue sniffers in other parts of the world to see if they knew any local contacts. Two weeks later I found one and this week I am accompanying the same attorney to go onsite and interview the head of the organization. Next week, the attorney and myself will take another trip out at night, this time to meet some of the street children and see the problem first hand.
For me, this experience has been very rewarding. I am able to see the progression of a lawsuit; best of all, I am directly involved in it. Most days I spend in front of the computer researching various areas of law and comparative analysis between different international countries. However, the attorneys are dedicated to finding opportunities for me to do some real fieldwork and see first hand all the injustices that are occurring in South Africa. Seeing the problem firsthand helps to put things into perspective; as now when I talk about glue sniffers, I will be talking about children like Thabiso and Nito; not just 'glue sniffers.' It is more rewarding to know the people you are really working for and where the benefits really need to go.
School of Law Annex