Pro Bono

Law firms are defined by the values they follow and the clients they serve. In 1929, John O’Melveny, the son of the Firm’s founder, helped establish, and served as the founding board president of, the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, the oldest and largest provider of free legal services to the poor in California. Since then, O’Melveny & Myers LLP has channeled the creativity and passion of its lawyers into public interest efforts that benefit the poor and powerless in local communities and society at large.

Our commitment to using our professional skills and resources for the benefit of those in need is exemplified by our successful defense of the Interest on Lawyers’ Trust Accounts programs before the U.S. Supreme Court. IOLTA is the nation’s second largest source of financial support for legal services for the poor. At risk was more than $200 million of funding – over 15% of the annual budget for indigent legal services nationwide. Our efforts preserved a range of benefits, from access to health care to protection against homelessness, on behalf of society’s most vulnerable members.

Through our Pro Bono Practice structure, each of our offices is able to quickly and effectively respond to the ever-changing needs of local low-income communities. The firm is able to utilize the expertise of our wide-ranging commercial practice to assist indigent individuals in nonprofit organizations in complex litigation, labor and employment, tax, corporate transactions, appeals, intellectual property, criminal law, mergers and acquisitions, bankruptcy, election law, and other types of sophisticated engagements.

In addition, our lawyers also partner with legal services organizations to engage in more traditional pro bono work involving immigration, housing, civil rights, the arts, children’s rights, education, family law/domestic violence, elder law, clinic work, contract and lease negotiations, nonprofit incorporation, consumer fraud, special education, death penalty, and public benefits.

We have chosen to focus much of our transactional pro bono efforts on microfinance, taking a leadership role nationally in this burgeoning movement. Microfinance transactions seek to combat extreme poverty by helping the most impoverished women and families in developing countries and elsewhere secure small but crucial loan proceeds that allow them to start businesses that can—and have been—impacting their lives in the most profound ways.

We also operate successful appellate litigation clinics at two leading law schools, Harvard and UCLA, supervising law students in pro bono appeals raising a variety of cutting-edge legal issues, such as the scope of the Second Amendment, what constitutes a prisoner’s meaningful access to legal materials, and whether convictions of certain crimes are deportable offenses. These clinics offer O'Melveny lawyers and law students the opportunity to garner invaluable appellate experience while providing representation to indigent appellants who would otherwise go unrepresented before the country's highest courts.

Key Facts

• Our long established policy of giving our lawyers full credit for all pro bono hours is reflective of our dedication. In 2010, our attorneys devoted more than 83,000 hours of legal representation to pro bono matters, averaging approximately 120 hours per lawyer.  The value of the work contributed by the Firm on behalf of the poor and voiceless amounted to US$40 million worth of legal services. This represented roughly 6.77% of our total billable output and involved the participation of more than 75% of the Firm’s lawyers.
• Under our firmwide Pro Bono Initiative, new lawyers in all US offices are required to handle at least one pro bono matter in their first year at the Firm. Each partner is expected to supervise at least one pro bono matter every year, and all attorneys are encouraged to perform at least 50 hours of pro bono work annually.
• We have appointed a firmwide partner-in-charge and a full-time managing counsel of pro bono. David Lash, our managing counsel for public interest and pro bono services, was named a 2006 “Attorney of the Year” by California Lawyer magazine.
• Our attorneys sit on the boards of major legal services organizations in every US city in which the firm practices. The Firm has satisfied key pledges around the country, including the Pro Bono Institute’s Pro Bono Challenge, which asks major law firms to devote not less than 3% of billable hours to pro bono service.
• We are a founding member of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization which grew out of President John F. Kennedy’s 1963 request to have major US law firms address the issue of racial discrimination.  

Awards & Recognitions

• O'Melveny was honored with the 2011 Beacon of Justice Award by the National Legal Aid & Defender Association
• American Bar Association honored O’Melveny with a 2011 Pro Bono Publico Award for outstanding service
• In June 2011, the Firm received the Justice For Children's Friend of Children Award for a decade of pro bono work
• O'Melveny was honored with the Inner City Law Center's 2011 Katherine Krause Award
• O'Melveny was one of five national law firms selected by not-for-profit organization Immigration Equality to receive its annual Safe Haven Award in 2011
• O'Melveny was one of ten law firms recently named to Law360's Pro Bono Firms of 2010 list based on the Firm's demonstrable commitment to community service
• In 2010, the Public Law Center presented the Firm with its prestigious Volunteer Law Firm of the Year Award.
• In 2010, the Mississippi Center for Justice honored the Firm, and O’Melveny litigation partner George Riley, for exemplary pro bono assistance on behalf of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina.
• Named to The American Lawyer's 2010 A-List, marking the third consecutive year that the Firm maintained its distinguished pro bono record among AmLaw 200 firms. Reflecting the continued importance of public interest legal work at the Firm, O'Melveny averaged just over 121 hours per lawyer on pro bono matters in 2009, placing it within the top 20 list of firms with the greatest commitment to providing free legal representation to underserved clients.
• In 2009, four O'Melveny attorneys were honored for their outstanding pro bono work at Public Counsel's 2009 Volunteer Appreciation Reception.
• O'Melveny was honored by the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles (LAFLA) in September 2009 as one of eight “Partners in Equal Justice” for its exemplary support that has sustained LAFLA over the years.
• Bet Tzedek honored O’Melveny with the 2008 Rose L. Schiff Commitment to Justice Award for handling significant cases for the organization and its clients, and working with the organization to develop cutting-edge community programs for the underserved poor.
• In July 2008, The Association of the Bar of the City of New York presented a team of our attorneys with the Thurgood Marshall Award for representing clients sentenced to death in a Section 1983 civil rights challenge to lethal injection in Arizona.
• The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area honored O'Melveny at its annual luncheon in 2008, giving the Firm its Special Homelessness Advocacy Award.
• The Firm received a Civic Commendation Award from the mayor of Redondo Beach in recognition of O’Melveny’s outstanding pro bono contributions to the city through the Trial Advocacy Prosecution Program (TAPP).
• The Firm and several of our attorneys received awards for outstanding pro bono service at the Legal Aid Society of New York’s Pro Bono Awards ceremonies in 2008 and 2009.
• Lamp Community, a nationally recognized nonprofit organization, honored O’Melveny with its Friend of Lamp Community Award 2007 for pro bono assistance with a difficult and time-consuming contract dispute.
• O’Melveny was recognized at the Asian American Justice Center’s 10th Annual American Courage Awards ceremony in Washington, DC.
• The Constitutional Rights Foundation of Orange County honored O'Melveny for actively contributing to the success of the organization’s 2006-2007 Mock Trial Competition.
• The Humane Society of the United States honored O’Melveny for outstanding pro bono work on behalf of animals. The Firm was particularly recognized for pro bono work on an amicus brief regarding the launching of a ballot initiative to outlaw greyhound racing in Massachusetts.
• Two O’Melveny attorneys were named Advocates of the Year by Public Counsel in 2007 and 2008.
• In recognition of O’Melveny’s immigration pro bono work, the Los Angeles County Bar Association presented us with its first-ever Pro Bono Immigration Service Award in 2008.
• The Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless recognized the Firm at its 2007 Volunteer Appreciation Reception.
• Our work on an appeal to the US Supreme Court in the Texas redistricting cases, G.I. Forum of Texas, et al. v. Perry et al., was recognized with a 2006 award from the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund.
• In 2006, we received the Asian American Justice Center’s Distinguished Service Award for our pro bono work in communities devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
• In 2006, The Legal Aid Society of New York honored us for work on behalf of a Sikh prisoner denied the right to practice his religion.

Pro Bono Practice Areas

• Providing access to justice
• Counseling on administrative law
• Upholding civil rights
• Defending the criminally accused
• Supporting community projects
• Ensuring adequate housing
• Protecting immigration rights
• Advocating before the U.S. Supreme Court
• Litigating a wide variety of civil disputes for low-income individuals, protecting property rights, and battling homelessness
• Advising charitable boards of directors on nonprofit governance, business, and corporate issues
• Representing nonprofit clients in labor and employment matters and on a broad range of transactional needs
• Negotiating mergers and acquisitions, lease agreements, and other real estate transactions for not-for-profit businesses