One of Harvard Law School’s Class of 2009 alums, Jacob Howard, has committed himself to legal service in the American South. This may seem unique for someone who grew up in Minnesota and Michigan. But his commitment to the South couldn’t be more sincere. And it stems from his dedication to prisoners and criminal defendants in that region that he cultivated while at HLS.
After graduating from the University of Michigan, Jake worked as a high school teacher in Seattle for three years. He enjoyed teaching contemporary world issues and multicultural studies, but he felt somewhat disconnected from the world issues he discussed with his students. He decided to come to law school to prepare for a career where he could tackle national and international concerns. The concern on the top of his list was human rights. After considering several law schools, he chose HLS for its renowned human rights program and its strong reputation in the public interest community.
While Jake originally intended to focus on international human rights, he discovered at HLS a newfound passion for human rights in the United States. Criminal justice issues — prison conditions, public defense, and the death penalty — occupied his focus. He remembers vividly the annual address on campus by Equal Justice Initiative executive director Bryan Stevenson, sponsored by HLS’ Office of Public Interest Advising. Stevenson does a lot of criminal justice and death penalty work, which Jake found admirable and inspiring. He decided to explore this work as a student.
At HLS, Jake served as president of the Prison Legal Assistance Project (PLAP), a student practice organization that represents Massachusetts state prisoners in prison disciplinary hearings. As a 1L, I worked with Jake in the PLAP office. His mastery of the prison system was astounding. He had earned the respect of many of our clients, who frequently requested his assistance personally. He also earned my strong admiration and the admiration of the dozens of other PLAP students who worked alongside him. Jake also enrolled in the clinical program called the Criminal Justice Institute, which allows students to represent clients in criminal matters. “The ability to work with clients and to actually represent people was my favorite part of law school,” Jake says. “I pretty much loved law school in general.”
During his 1L summer, Jake explored his interest in human rights and criminal justice as an intern in Mississippi. He worked for a civil rights attorney named Rob McDuff. Mr. McDuff assigned Jake work on multiple issues: voting rights, conditions of confinement, death penalty work, and others. He even got a chance to work on part of the Jena Six case. “The variety of stuff was pretty amazing,” he observes. He would visit clients on death row. On the weekend, he visited a female juvenile detention center and interviewed girls there. The center eventually shut down after, among other concerns, it was discovered that several girls had been held in shackles for large portions of time.
Jake knew that he wanted to return to the South to continue his legal work on criminal justice. After his 2L year, he spent the summer in Georgia and Alabama with the Southern Center for Human Rights. He visited county jails in Mississippi and interviewed prisoners there. In one case that occurred during his summer, a federal judge threw a county sheriff into his own jail to force him to experience the inadequacy of the jail’s cafeteria food!
After his summer experiences, Jake knew he was committed to criminal work in the South. He passed the Mississippi bar and plans to provide criminal legal services there. Before he begins, however, he will first wrap up his current clerkship in federal district court in Montgomery, AL. Jake wanted to work for a Southern judge whose opinions and legal style he admired. “I love my judge,” Jake says. “He was my first choice.”
After his clerkship, Jake will go to Georgetown Law School on a two-year Prettyman Fellowship. He will spend the first year doing public defender work and the second year teaching in Georgetown’s clinical program. After this exciting opportunity is complete, Jake will finally return to the South to serve clients with criminal trouble.
– Emily
