Robert Schwartz co-founded Juvenile Law Center in 1975 and has been its executive director since 1982. With over 30 years at Juvenile Law Center, Schwartz is a national leader in advocating for children's rights and has extensive experience in all areas of juvenile law.
In his career at Juvenile Law Center, Schwartz has represented dependent and delinquent children in Pennsylvania juvenile and appellate courts; brought class-action litigation over institutional conditions and probation functions; testified in Congress before House and Senate committees; and spoken in over 25 states on matters related to children and the law.
Schwartz's career has not been limited to Pennsylvania, but has included fighting nationally and internationally for juvenile rights. From 1992-98 he was chair of the Juvenile Justice Committee of the American Bar Association's Criminal Justice Section, a position he resumed in 2006. In 1993 he visited South Africa to help develop a legal system for children. In 1993 he also co-authored the American Bar Association's report, America's Children at Risk; and in 1995 he helped author a follow-up report on youth's access to quality lawyers, A Call for Justice.
From 1996-2006, Schwartz was a member of the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice. As part of the Network, he co-edited Youth on Trial: A Developmental Perspective on Juvenile Justice (University of Chicago Press: 2000). From 1996-99 he was a gubernatorial appointee to the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency. Since 1991 he has been a gubernatorial appointee to the Commission's Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Committee which is the State Advisory Group that distributes federal funds in Pennsylvania and advises the governor regarding juvenile justice policy. Schwartz in 2005 became chair of the Advisory Committee to the Children's Rights Division of Human Rights Watch. Schwartz also is chair of the Board of the Philadelphia Youth Network.
He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Andrew Hamilton Award, presented by the Philadelphia Bar Association "for exemplary service in the public interest," the Reginald Heber Smith Award, presented by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association, the Livingston Hall Award, presented by the American Bar Association, and the Stephen M. Cahn Award, presented by the National Association of Counsel for Children for career achievement. Schwartz is a graduate of Haverford College and Temple University School of Law.
Terry Schuster joined Juvenile Law Center in September 2009 as a Justice Corps Fellow from the University of Texas School of Law. During law school, Terry worked on juvenile prison reform efforts in Texas, California, and Ohio. Working with the Ombudsman for the Texas Youth Commission, Terry argued successfully to end the use of long-term isolation as a disciplinary measure for youth in Texas juvenile facilities. He monitored the use of mental health placements and resources in the California Department of Juvenile Justice, working with the Special Master appointed to oversee the California juvenile prison reform effort. He also researched and proposed a youth advocate staff position for incarcerated youth facing disciplinary proceedings in the Ohio Department of Youth Services. This staff position is currently being piloted with the oversight of the Court Monitor overseeing the Ohio juvenile prison reform effort.
Terry worked with the Honorable Judge Jeanne Meurer on developing a proposal for a Juvenile Gang Intervention Court in Travis County, Texas. This project involved a collaboration with national and local experts on youth involved in gangs, to design an effective intervention program through the juvenile court and probation system. Terry has also worked with the Texas RioGrande Legal Aid Public Defender office on the Texas-Mexico border, and the University of Texas Capital Punishment Clinic.
Before beginning law school in 2006, Terry helped some friends open a restaurant in Austin, Texas, worked as a proofreader for the Texas House of Representatives, and was a part-time caregiver at Project Transitions AIDS hospice. He graduated from Duke University in 2003 with a degree in English, and was chosen by the faculty to be the student speaker at graduation.
Marsha Levick co-founded Juvenile Law Center in 1975 and served as its first executive director until 1982. In her 30-year legal career, Levick has been an advocate for juvenile and women's rights and is a nationally recognized leader in juvenile law. During her term as executive director at Juvenile Law Center, Levick represented many individual children in delinquency and dependency proceedings and litigated challenges to conditions of confinement in juvenile institutions and standards for pre-trial detention throughout Pennsylvania. In 1995 she became Juvenile Law Center's legal director and now manages the Center's litigation and appellate docket. In that capacity she has successfully litigated challenges to the state Department of Education's failure to provide pre-trial school-aged youth in county prisons with basic and special education; the Department of Public Welfare's failure to ensure the availability of foster care payments to eligible kinship care givers; a local detention center's failure to ensure the safety of a mentally ill resident; and a Pennsylvania statute denying Philadelphia adjudicated youth the opportunity to return to their regular public schools after completing residential placement. In addition, Levick has authored or co-authored numerous appellate and amicus briefs in state and federal appeals courts throughout the country, including many before the US Supreme Court, and has argued before both state and federal appellate courts in Pennsylvania and elsewhere. Levick and Juvenile Law Center garnered media attention recently as one of the leading organizations to file an amicus brief against the juvenile death penalty in Roper v. Simmons, where the Supreme Court ultimately held the juvenile death penalty unconstitutional. Levick has also co-authored scholarly articles on zero tolerance policies, girls in the juvenile justice system, and juveniles' right to counsel at all stages of the juvenile court process. From 1982-1988, Levick worked for the National Organization of Women Legal Defense and Education Fund, serving first as legal director and then executive director. From 1989-1995 she worked in private practice for a commercial litigation firm specializing in securities industry disputes. Nationally, Ms. Levick worked with the American Bar Association's special taskforce to develop standards for the prosecution of juveniles in the adult criminal justice system, and serves on the boards of the National Juvenile Defender Center and Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana. Levick is also a member of the advisory board of Rutgers-Camden Law School's Juvenile Justice Clinic. In 2006, Levick was the recipient of the Temple Law School Women's Law Caucus annual Professional Achievement Award. Levick is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Temple University Beasley School of Law. She is an adjunct faculty member at both the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Temple University Beasley School of Law, where she teaches courses on Juvenile Justice and Appellate Advocacy.
Megan Bruce came to Juvenile Law Center in 2010. She is a 2007 graduate of Ohio University, where she majored in English with a minor in French. Prior to her position at Juvenile Law Center, she worked as a copywriter at an interactive media agency and in the marketing department of a global magazine publishing company. She has written for several publications, including the Harrisburg Patriot-News and IR magazine. Her duties at Juvenile Law Center include creating and executing a variety of print and online communications; maintaining the organization's social media presence; and editing and updating the website.
Lourdes M. Rosado joined Juvenile Law Center in 1998 after completing the E. Barrett Prettyman Fellowship in Juvenile Justice at Georgetown University Law Center. As a Prettyman Fellow, Ms. Rosado represented juveniles in delinquency proceedings in the District of Columbia Superior Court, and taught trial advocacy and criminal procedure to third-year law students. Ms. Rosado was awarded an LLM in Trial Advocacy from Georgetown.
At Juvenile Law Center, Ms. Rosado represents youth in the dependency and delinquency systems, researches and writes appellate court and amicus briefs on legal issues affecting children, pursues civil litigation on behalf of institutionalized children, and trains lawyers who represent children. Ms. Rosado is a graduate of Swarthmore College, where she was a Eugene M. Lang Scholar, and New York University Law School, where she was a Root-Tilden-Snow Scholar and won the Judge Aileen Haas Schwartz Award for outstanding work in the field of children and the law. Immediately following law school, Ms. Rosado served as a law clerk to the Honorable John R. Padova, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Before becoming an attorney, Ms. Rosado worked as a business reporter for Newsweek and other publications, and received a Master's degree from the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs.
Autumn Dickman, MSS, MLSP, came to Juvenile Law Center as a graduate student in the fall of 2004. As a student she worked with Bob Schwartz on the aftercare portion of the MacArthur Models for Change initiative. Beginning in September of 2005 she transitioned to a full-time staff member as Juvenile Law Center's Project Manager for the Pennsylvania Models for Change (MfC) initiative. Funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, MfC is a national initiative to accelerate promising models for juvenile justice system reform. In Pennsylvania, the efforts are focused on three targeted areas of improvement: aftercare, disproportionate minority contact, and mental health / juvenile justice system coordination. In her role as project manager, Ms. Dickman works in all three targeted areas to advance the goals of the initiative at both the state policy level and in the model counties; she helps to link national resources to the Pennsylvania efforts; works to enhance the coordination and communication of a wide spectrum stakeholders within the state; and serves as a liaison between the MacArthur Foundation and MfC grantees within Pennsylvania. Previously Ms. Dickman worked at the National Youth Employment Coalition (NYEC) on PEPNet (Promising and Effective Practices Network), a self-evaluation and improvement process for youth employment and work force development programs; and at the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) in the Violence Prevention and Youth Development division. Her work at CDF focused on juvenile justice, and gun safety legislation and research. Ms. Dickman received her Masters in Social Service and her Masters in Law and Social Policy from the Bryn Mawr Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research in 2005; she received her BA in Psychology from the University of Virginia.
Jenny Pokempner joined Juvenile Law Center in 2001 as a Skadden Fellow. She had previously served as a law clerk to the Honorable Andre M. Davis, District Court of Maryland. Last year, she co-authored with Professor Dorothy Roberts of the Northwestern School of Law an article entitled "Poverty, Welfare, and the Meaning of Disability", which appeared in the Spring 2001 issue of the Ohio State Law Review. Ms. Pokempner has worked extensively with children in Baltimore, including at the Harlem Park Middle School, and for organizations such as Teach Baltimore. Prior to attending law school, Jenny worked as a paralegal in the child advocacy unit at the Legal Aid Bureau in Baltimore City. As a law student she worked for Community Legal Service and Juvenile Law Center in Philadelphia. Ms. Pokempner is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and University of Pennsylvania Law School. At Juvenile Law Center, Jenny focuses on issues relating to teenagers and young adults who are in foster care and are transitioning out of the child welfare system. As well, Jenny is working on increasing the supports available for homeless teenagers.
Debbie Hollimon-Williams has been with Juvenile Law Center since 1997. She assists with the administration of Juvenile Law Center's legal work, maintains various databases, and handles all of the reception for the organization. She was drawn to Juvenile Law Center because of their work with children in the dependency system.
Jessica Feierman, supervising attorney, joined Juvenile Law Center in 2006. Prior to joining Juvenile Law Center, Jessica was a litigation fellow at the ACLU National Prison Project, where she litigated conditions of confinement cases in federal court on behalf of incarcerated adults and children. From 2001-2003, Jessica was a teaching fellow in the Georgetown University Law Center's Street Law in the Community Program, where she taught law students to provide practical courses in the law in D.C.'s prisons, homeless shelters and residential treatment facilities. From 2000-2001, Jessica served as a law clerk to the Honorable Warren J. Ferguson on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Jessica is a graduate of Wesleyan University and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and was awarded an LLM in advocacy from Georgetown University Law Center. In law school, Jessica provided law-related education in Philadelphia's juvenile detention centers and represented children in family court at the Juvenile Rights Division of New York's Legal Aid Society. Prior to attending law school, Jessica founded and directed the Teen Health Initiative at the New York Civil Liberties Union.
Rosie McNamara-Jones joined Juvenile Law Center in 2006. Her fundraising responsibilities are focused primarily on increasing the scope of Juvenile Law Center donor relationships through stewardship, marketing, communications and brand development. Before joining Juvenile Law Center, Rosie spent eight years within the corporate marketing department at Comcast Cable managing marketing/communications, original programming/production and community relations. Rosie graduated from Temple University with a degree in Business Administration and where also studied violin performance at Temple's Esther Boyer College of Music. She and has background in non-profit arts administration, as well as musical performance.
Emily Keller joined Juvenile Law Center in September 2008 as the seventh Sol and Helen Zubrow Fellow in Children's Law. Emily graduated magna cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School in 2007. Before starting at Juvenile Law Center, Emily served as a law clerk to the Honorable Robert N. Chatigny, United States District Court for the District of Connecticut.
During law school, Emily served on the board of the law school’s Organization of Public Interest Students, was a founding member of Legal Advocates for Children and Youth, and, as Symposium Editor of the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, organized a symposium on the future of child advocacy. She interned at the juvenile division of the Washtenaw County Office of the Public Defender and spent her summers working at the University of Michigan Child Advocacy Law Clinic and at the Center for Children’s Law and Policy in Washington, D.C. Emily was awarded a Bergstrom Child Welfare Summer Law Fellowship and a Dean’s Public Service Fellowship.
Prior to law school, Emily spent one year as an AmeriCorps member at the Choice Program in Montgomery County, Maryland, where she served as a caseworker for youth on probation. She then spent three years in the development department at Fight Crime: Invest in Kids in Washington, D.C.
Emily graduated magna cum laude from Brown University in 2000 with a degree in Public Policy and American Institutions. During college, she interned at the Rhode Island Office of the Child Advocate and the Attorney General’s juvenile unit. She spent summers working with teenagers with a wide range of emotional, behavioral and learning disabilities at Ramapo for Children in Rhinebeck, New York.
Tom Reinstein is a litigation paralegal at Juvenile Law Center. He graduated magna cum laude from Cornell University in 2008 with a B.A. in History. His primary activities at Juvenile Law Center include organizing and filing amicus briefs, keeping all reference materials updated, and legal research. Tom also assists with electronic case document management.
Riya S. Shah joined Juvenile Law Center in September 2005 as the fourth Sol and Helen Zubrow Fellow in Children's Law. While at Juvenile Law Center, Riya has represented youth in dependency court, researched and written amicus briefs and conducted trainings for child-serving professionals. Riya also coauthored several Juvenile Law Center publications, including a manual on child abuse reporting, a manual on minor's health care rights, a monograph on minors' rights against self incrimination, and guides to juvenile records and expungement for attorneys and youth.
Prior to being awarded the Zubrow fellowship, Riya graduated cum laude from Loyola University Chicago School of Law in May 2005, where she was a Civitas ChildLaw Fellow. At Loyola, Riya was an active member of the Public Interest Law Society, the president of the ChildLaw Society, and Editor-in-Chief of The Children's Legal Rights Journal, a legal journal published with the ABA Center on Children and the Law and the National Association of Counsel for Children. Riya is a graduate of University of Michigan Ann Arbor where she earned her B.A. in Psychology and American Culture. While at University of Michigan, Riya received a W.K. Kellogg Community Based Research Fellowship based on an original research proposal to develop quality of life indicators for Detroit-area children affected by and infected with HIV and AIDS. After college, she was a Teach for America Corps member in Jersey City, New Jersey where she taught second grade, and a bilingual third grade teacher in Detroit, Michigan.
Jessica Sones came to Juvenile Law Center in 2009. She graduated magna cum laude from Eastern University with a degree in social work. At Juvenile Law Center, Jess provides support for attorneys as they represent children in the child welfare system; she maintains contact with the clients, their social workers, and their service providers. In addition, Jess coordinates meetings for youth who are aging out of the foster care system, conducts “Know Your Rights” trainings for youth in the foster care system, responds to intake inquiries, and coordinates the undergraduate internship program.
Katherine Burdick joined Juvenile Law Center in September 2009 as the eighth Sol and Helen Zubrow Fellow in Children’s Law. She graduated from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law in 2009. In law school, Katherine interned at Legal Services for Children, participated in the California Asylum Representation Clinic, was a summer associate with Morgan Lewis & Bockius in San Francisco, and helped litigate a forced disappearance case before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights through a summer internship with the Myrna Mack Foundation in Guatemala City and a semester with Berkeley’s International Human Rights Law Clinic. She was Co-Chair of Berkeley’s Family Law Society, Executive Editor and Submissions Editor of the Berkeley La Raza Law Journal, and a member of Berkeley’s American Association of Justice Student Trial Advocacy Team. Prior to law school, Katherine taught for two years at the American School of Guatemala in Guatemala City and volunteered at a Guatemala City orphanage.
Katherine graduated magna cum laude from Brown University, where she double majored in Public Policy and American Institutions and Hispanic Literature and Culture. In college, Katherine received an Arthur Liman Public Interest Law Fellowship to intern with Rhode Island Legal Services’ family advocacy program and a Governor Licht Fellowship to intern in Governor Carcieri’s policy office. She spent another summer as a Public Interest Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Office of Public Interest Advising. Katherine studied one semester in Seville, Spain, and is fluent in Spanish.
Joann Viola joined Juvenile Law Center in 1990. Her administrative responsibilities include finances, human resources, fundraising/development, facilities and general office administration.
Kristina joined Juvenile Law Center in August 2009 as a deferred associate from Dechert, LLP. Kristina graduated cum laude from Temple University Beasley School of Law in 2009.
During law school, Kristina served as an executive member of the Student Public Interest Network, and the National Lawyer's Guild Street Law Project for youth. She was a research editor for the Temple Law Review, and the recipient of a number of scholarships for academic achievement and community involvement. Kristina represented indigent clients in Temple's Public Defender and Family Law clinical programs. She assisted survivors of domestic violence during an internship at Women Against Abuse Legal Center, and provided legal advocacy and education to individuals who experienced LGBT-related discrimination during an internship at Equality Advocates Pennsylvania.
Prior to law school, Kristina volunteered one year of service as an AmeriCorps JustServe member in Seattle, Washington where she co-coordinated a violence prevention program for middle school youth involved with the Seattle Human Services Department. She then managed an after school program for low income youth in Ithaca, New York through Urban 4-H and Cornell Cooperative Extension - Tompkins County.
Kristina graduated magna cum laude from Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, PA in 2004 with a bachelor degree in Gender Studies and American Studies. During college, Kristina served on the executive board of the Women's Center and led an improv acting group addressing social issues.
Yowei Shaw joined Juvenile Law Center as a member of the 2010-2011 cohort of Philly Fellows. As the Associate for Youth Engagement, she works with Youth Fostering Change and Juveniles 4 Justice, and also responds to intake phone calls.
Prior to coming to JLC, Yowei interned for Philadelphia City Paper, WHYY’s Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane, and WXPN’s Morning Show. In her spare time, she enjoys volunteering at the Divine Bike Church and blogging about her audio pursuits. She graduated magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 2010 with a degree in Sociology.
