The many ways that attorneys can enhance access to justice for immigrant detainees who seek asylum range from providing direct legal assistance to advocating support for the federal Citizenship Promotion Act that was introduced last month.

Mary Meg McCarthy, director of the Chicago-based National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), outlined the needs and potential solutions to member of the North Suburban Bar Association during a dinner March 21 in Glenview.

McCarthy attended the event to receive the association's annual Gary Wild Memorial Award from President Nancy Vizer and Judge Allen S. Goldberg, who chaired the presentation.

A recent NIJC success story McCarthy related is that of a 21-year-old Buddhist who fled from religious persecution in Tibet and was detained for almost four months by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials.

Lobsang Palden had extreme difficulty communicating with jail personnel and could speak to a lawyer only if a volunteer Tibetan translator were available.

Handout material provided by McCarthy listed eight other cases in which NIJC legal staff and volunteer attorneys obtained asylum for detainees who sought safe havens in the United States.

Among them is an Afghan army officer who came to the U.S. to study English. Religious extremists accused him of converting to Christianity. They warned him not to return and attacked the United Nations literacy school where his wife taught.

Pro Bono Project volunteer Amir Azaran of Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg won asylum for the man, who had been held by the Department of Homeland Security.

Two men from Togo who supported a political opposition party abandoned homes, possessions and businesses to seek protection in nearby countries, and eventually in the U.S.

Volunteer attorneys who succeeded in their asylum cases were Peter Gillespie of Baker & McKenzie, Doug Feldman of Patton & Ryan, and Leo Feldman of Teller, Levit & Silvertrust.

NIJC attorneys Lisa Koop, Bing Luo and Jefferson Mock helped a pregnant Chinese woman who was forced to endure a chemically induced abortion after previously giving borth to an “unauthorized” child.

Fearing forcible sterilization by the government, she entered the U.S. through Mexico in 2004, with the help of a smuggler, and eventually was granted asylum.

In addition to individual cases, attorneys have been denied access to immigrants who were arrested after an increasing number of workplace raids and threatened with deportation.

A raid near South Bend, Ind., on March 7 led to about 34 immigrants being held in Chicago and pressured to sign statements that admitted to deportability. More than half were women, some forced to leave children behind.

The NIJC, a recipient of annual grants from the Lawyers Trust Fund of Illinois, for three decades has blended advocacy of individual clients with broad-based changes in human rights for immigrants.

For information about initiatives and opportunities for pro bono assistance, call Tara Tidwell at (312) 660-1337.