This publicly available database contains more than 650 opinions from the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and will serve as a valuable resource supporting advocacy work and protecting human rights. As the Working Group issues new opinions, we will update the database.

I’m proud to be part of this important work, and I’m delighted to support this effort as part of our ongoing commitment to the rule of law.

You can learn more about the project from the news release.

Organizations such as Diversity in Practice, located in Minneapolis, MN are working hard to change those statistics by supporting and encouraging lawyers of color. 

On Oct. 27, 75 minority law students from local law schools will gather to meet their mentors for a 6-month Ambassador program. The kick-off event, which starts at 5 p.m. at the Minneapolis offices of Faegre & Benson, is one of several programs that Diversity in Practice coordinates to fulfill their mission to recruit, retain and promote lawyers of color here in the Twin Cities metro area. 

To learn more about the Twin Cities Diversity in Practice organization or to participate in an upcoming event, logon to diversityinpractice.org.

I’ve had the pleasure of working with Senator Klobuchar for many years, beginning during my tenure as Mayor of Minneapolis – Senator Klobuchar was serving as the Hennepin County District Attorney at the same time.

Senator Klobuchar met with members of Thomson Reuters’ Government Affairs team, including our General Counsel Deirdre Stanley and SVP & Global Head of Government & Regulatory Affairs Ambassador Paula Dobriansky to discuss current legislative issues that matter to a business like ours. Senator Klobuchar is the only member of the U.S. Senate who sits on both the Judiciary and Commerce committees – two committees that directly impact Thomson Reuters.

You can see by this photo that we are using telepresence technology to hold this meeting. If you’ve never experienced a meeting via telepresence, I highly recommend it. Very innovative technology!

Photo by Adam Lockhart

Senator Klobuchar then participated in a Q&A session with a group of 100 Thomson Reuters employees. Her up-close-and-personal-view of the Supreme Court Justice conferee process was of particular interest to the many legal professionals in the room.

Photo by Adam Lockhart

Photo by Jeannette Appold

It’s important for our elected officials to understand our business and our employees, and based on today’s visit, our employees want to know our elected officials, too.

One more thing … give Senator Klobuchar’s Taconite Tater Tot Hot Dish a try.

Thomson Reuters Foundation’s TrustLaw service attracts organizations with limited means that need free legal assistance. This includes NGOs and social entrepreneurs. It helps to bring them together with law firms who can provide pro bono services. Thirteen years ago, the Foundation established very strict criteria to accept members to AlertNet, the first humanitarian news network, in order to protect itself from risk and ensure that we only deal with reputable organizations. It applies the same principles to TrustLaw through a rigorous evaluation of members against our company’s Trust Principles and Code of Conduct.

Now the Foundation also benefits from a new tool to complement this evaluation: the Global Screening online service provided by GRC.

The online service is used by law firms, financial institutions and corporations to screen prospective clients. It’s used to check if they are:

• Sanctioned by the UN, EU and other bodies for money laundering, terrorist activities, or other criminal activity
• Politically exposed persons (PEPs) that may pose a risk

One thing that makes this service unique is it offers ongoing screening. Every night records are checked and alerts are sent to users of the service.

Monique Villa, CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, said: “Thanks to GRC’s excellent screening tool, we are now much more confident that we properly evaluate every member, and are able to monitor organizations on an ongoing basis. This is extremely useful and the tool is so fast that it is just a pleasure to use for our due diligence process.”

Patrick Hinchin, director of global screening in GRC said: “With new regulations coming in the near future, such as the Anti-bribery Act in the UK, we can see an immense opportunity for more businesses around the globe to use this service.”

Earlier this week the Foundation launched the “Haiti in Focus” campaign which will put our free legal, humanitarian and media services to work for Haiti’s recovery in 2011. A main element of this campaign is the “Rule of Law” project which is committed to fighting sexual violence against women, providing legal training for lawyers and connecting people with pro bono legal services. 

Before the earthquake Haiti’s anti-rape laws were only recently enacted and rarely enforced, but since then an epidemic of sexual violence against women has broken out in the tent cities in and around Port-au-Prince. 

Watch this sobering video from our Reuters journalists on the prevalence of sexual crimes in the wake of the earth quake. 

With the help of the Foundation’s TrustLaw network of pro bono lawyers around the world the project will help the government strengthen existing anti-rape laws and identify new opportunities for additional legislation to be created. 

The Foundation also will work with the Legal Bar Association of Port-au-Prince and our colleagues from the West LegalEdcenter to develop training and education materials for Haitian lawyers so they can continue to improve the rule of law in their country. 

There is no question that immediately after the quake many rallied to support the emergency efforts. But it’s clear the need is still very real and it’s paramount that we continue to provide support to the people of Haiti. And for me personally, it makes me proud to work for a company that feels the same.

If you’d like to learn more about the “Haiti in Focus” initiative visit the Thomson Reuters Foundation’s website.

TrustLaw, an organization run by the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was created as a resource to link lawyers with those in need.

A free webcast of a program centered on TrustLaw and on moving pro bono work worldwide is available on West LegalEdcenter.

Hosted by Peter Warwick, Legal’s president and CEO, discusses other efforts focused on global pro bono work, including an in-depth case study of the Campaign for Female Education (Camfed), a charity that educates girls and empowers young women in sub-Saharan Africa.

The “Global Pro Bono” webcast also includes a panel discussion from experienced legal professionals led by NYU School of Law professor, legal scholar and West Key Author Arthur Miller.

Monique Villa, CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation and TrustLaw, explained the rationale behind creating the TrustLaw organization:

Apart from the five big countries where pro bono is really well organized – the U.S., U.K., Canada, South Africa and Australia – pro bono in many countries is completely ad hoc, and in even more countries it doesn’t exist at all. A place where you have an electronic platform allows for the spread of a pro bono culture all over the world.

One example of the pro bono culture can be seen in the work done with Camfed. Diana Good, retired partner of LinkLaters, co-authored the report “Camfed Governance, Accounting to the Girl,” and spoke on how the pro bono work allowed the organization to focus its efforts on the governance model it developed.

Ann Cotton, executive director, Camfed International, went further to explain how governance models impact the lives of disenfranchised people around the world:

We are accountable to the very poorest people, and so we have to build systems of recourse and redress because they don’t really exist. The poor are the majority in the world today and we are still making decisions on their behalf as to what they need – we expect them to stand in line and be dually grateful as to what they receive. What does that do psychologically? We have to create new processes and systems that actually unlock the confidence and sense of entitlements in our clients so that dynamic changes.

You can watch the full program, ”Global Pro Bono,” on West LegalEdcenter.

After the program concluded, we talked with Arthur Miller about the importance of pro bono, in this video interview:

This week, TrustLaw and Thomson Reuters, Legal, held an event in Minneapolis that brought together leaders from law firms, courts and law schools, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that can benefit the most from pro bono legal work.

The event, a roundtable discussion on Sept. 21 titled “Pro Bono Trends Around the World,” featured several key figures in the Minneapolis/St. Paul legal and public service community including Doug Johnson of the Center for Victims of Torture; Robert Stein, former dean and currently professor of the University of Minnesota Law School and an attorney at Gray Plant Mooty; and Justice G. Barry Anderson of the Minnesota Supreme Court.

“TrustLaw has three goals,” notes Thomson Reuters Foundation CEO Monique Villa, “Put in contact the lawyers who are ready to work on a pro bono basis with NGOs, social entrepreneurs and governments in need of legal advice who cannot afford it. The second and third layer of our website are about news and information and a database of laws and best practices on both pro bono and on anti-corruption and good governance because we think that’s a crucial problem in our times.”

Villa was joined on the discussion panel by Thomson Reuters, Legal, President and CEO Peter Warwick and Sharon Sayles Belton, a former mayor of Minneapolis and now vice president of Government Affairs and Community Relations at Thomson Reuters, Legal.

Representatives of the NGOs who were invited to the Minneapolis event were interested in TrustLaw’s possibilities.

“I think it’s always exciting to talk about pro bono. We’re a volunteer-based organization so it’s always exciting to make the connection with other organizations,” said Jennifer Prestholdt, deputy director of The Advocates for Human Rights. “I was really excited to hear about TrustLaw, because for the human rights organizations that we work with around the world it’s going to be a tremendous resource to be able to put them in contact with (TrustLaw).”

This short video clip features several interviews that we did after the panel discussion, including with Monique Villa, Robin Phillips of The Advocates for Human Rights and Doug Johnson of the Center for Victims of Torture:

Just after rain clouds parted, the sounds of the Mississippi River mixed with a lively band at the Nicollet Island Pavilion in Minneapolis on Sept. 2 for the Volunteer Lawyers Network Annual Benefactors’ Pro Bono Picnic.

The cocktail hour, which featured treats like fresh popcorn and grilled goods, was followed by the gathering of supporters for the dinner program. Tables were sponsored by many local law firms and businesses, including Thomson Reuters, as employees attended to help support the Volunteer Lawyers Network (VLN) and its exceptional impact on our community.

While VLN volunteers piled guests’ plates high with picnic fare, the crowd learned from Tom Tinkham, chair of the VLN Benefactors, that the event had raised more than $95,000.

Tinkham said that without the people who actually represent the clients in need, the VLN would not continue to be successful.

He acknowledged the supportive judges from the Hennepin District County (Minn.) courts, who show that the program is indeed a community resource worth supporting, as well as the VLN staff, including Executive Director Sue Pontinen, who heads the program that now includes more than 800 attorneys.

Guest speaker and former Minnesota Supreme Court Chief Justice Eric Magnuson presented the Volunteer of the Year award to Bill Fisher of Gray Plant Mooty.

Before the crowd gave Fisher his standing ovation, they learned that he had represented over 980 VLN consumer cases – while also recruiting new volunteers, participating in local clinics and serving on the MSBA Bankruptcy Pro Bono Committee.

Justice Magnuson also recognized Karen Canon, of U.S. Bancorp’s Legal department, with the John D. Levine Distinguished Service Award. Canon has been a member of VLN since 1987 and on its board of directors since 1988, but Justice Magnuson joked that Canon had been providing pro bono services since she was a small child of “nine years old.”

The program ended with a short video featuring families that have been assisted by the VLN. As part of the presentation, FindLaw legal article writer Melissa Grams discussed her experiences helping those in need through VLN.

As the nearly 200 picnic-goers finished the evening with ice cream, it was clear that the gathering had been a roaring success.

Jennifer Coleman
Team Specialist
Thomson Reuters, Legal

We’re pleased to announce the launch of TrustLaw, the legal arm of the Thomson Reuters Foundation. The new service will widen access to the rule of law and promote greater transparency, empowering people with trusted information and free legal assistance.

Monique Villa, CEO of the Thomson Reuters Foundation, said : “The Thomson Reuters Foundation has set itself an ambitious goal: to create a truly international new marketplace connecting those in need of free legal assistance with those able to provide it – anywhere in the world.”

TrustLaw will serve as a global online resource for anti-corruption and good governance, and brings together a repository of information, advice and best practice, along with agenda-setting material from the Foundation’s expert editorial team.

With the help of a unique new platform, TrustLaw Connect, social entrepreneurs, NGOs and government agencies will be able to readily access pro bono legal support from lawyers anywhere in the world – for free.

More than 190 organizations working in over 140 countries have already joined TrustLaw Connect, including more than 60 leading global law firms and 80 NGOs.

Pro bono work is particularly important to the legal businesses of Thomson Reuters, who work to help the legal system perform better – every day, worldwide. In 2009 alone, the company donated more than US$20 million in free Westlaw access for pro bono services.

Read the full news release here.

Photo by Shannon Kunkle

Members of the University of Minnesota’s Raptor Center were on the the Eagan, Minn. campus of Thomson Reuters, Legal, yesterday to demonstrate the wonders of wild birds of prey as part of Green Week activities. The raptor center specializes in the medical care, rehabilitation, conservation, and study of eagles, hawks, owls, and falcons.

But birds of prey aren’t the only feathered friends on the Eagan campus these days.

Two dozen wooden bird houses, four wood duck houses and three chimney swift towers (like the one above) were constructed by employee volunteers as part of the company’s Green Team efforts. The Eagan campus now has more than 40 birdhouses available for these migrating birds.

Watch Legal Current for more information about other Green Team efforts at the Legal headquarters this week including restoring a 10-acre prairie and planting a community garden.