Cahill Honored by The Legal Aid Society for Fourth Consecutive Year
Date: 10/07/08
Cahill is again the recipient of the Pro Bono Publico Award, presented by The Legal Aid Society of New York. The 2008 award recognizes the firm's outstanding pro bono service in major projects in Civil, Juvenile Rights and Criminal practice areas.
The firm has been a stalwart of the Kathryn A. McDonald Education Advocacy Project of the Juvenile Rights Practice and has for the last four years provided legal assistance to meet the special educational needs of neglected and abused children who are now in foster care. Under the leadership of David G. Januszewski, the firm is honored for its exceptional appellate representation of 25 clients of the Criminal Appeals Project.
Melissa Osipoff and Julie Kurdes are recognized for their diligent representation of a family with four children with severe disabilities, successfully securing specialized children's services and ensuring these services remained in place when the children transitioned out of foster care to rejoin their birth parents. Former associate Elizabeth Tuculescu is recognized for her legal work on behalf of many young clients of the Society, helping them to obtain services for their academic development and stabilize their foster care placements.
Wendy T. Wylegala has continued her diligent representation of abused, abandoned, and neglected immigrant youth to secure Special Immigrant Juvenile Status for youth at risk of deportation.
Laura Padin and Gabriel Posner are honored for their vigorous advocacy in contested cases to obtain safe and decent apartments for tenants in the Queens Civil Practice's Housing Court Habitable Homes Project.
Through its partnership with the Legal Aid Society, Cahill provides representation to young children who are the subjects of abuse and neglect proceedings in New York Family Courts, disabled individuals in need of social security benefits, immigrant youth who are the subjects of abuse, tenants who are denied the most basic of services, and handles criminal appeals on behalf of indigent defendants.