My Internship at California Innocence Project
The California Innocence Project is a clinical law program at California Western School of Law where they try to help those who were wrongfully convicted. They receive over 2,000 claims of innocence every year. There are multiple steps in deciding what cases are accepted. It starts by getting contacted by the inmate or family members usually with a letter, then the inmate receives a questionnaire, once we receive the questionnaire back it goes through prescreen. Precreen means we haven't received legal documents but we are looking at the questionnaire. The next step is AOB Prescreen which means we received legal documents containing a statement of facts. Once we received those documents we examine them and write a memo suggesting if we should continue working on the case or if we should close it. It then goes into staff review and then it goes to one of the law students to investigate further. One of my roles was to open letters and respond to them with prewritten letters either moving them forward in the process or rejecting them for predetermined reasons. Another one of my roles was to answer the phones and answer the questions people have.
My Project
My first project was to open the mail, read whatever was inside, a letter or legal documents, scan them into our computers and reply with a letter stating what we decided to do. After we replied we had to make note of whatever we did in Clio, a website where we kept track of clients, so if something else came from that person we would know what the last person did. I started another project and it was to look up law firms we are partnered with and get their San Diego partners or associates contacts. I created a spreadsheet with their information like their bar number, email, and phone number.
What I Learned
I think my two biggest skills I have learned at this internship is how to speak with people over the phone especially in delicate situations like this. You sometimes get people who are extremely emotional and I have needed to know how to handle those. The second skill I think I have gained or improved upon is my patience, I have always had a short temper but with answering the phones you get some people who are rude and will yell at you. Getting frustrated and annoyed with someone is not a good trait but because of answering the phones I have been able to calm myself along with others down and it ends up being a more pleasant experience.
Reflection
I think the biggest area in which I grew is in communication. Throughout this internship I was communicating with other interns and attorneys. Normally I don’t like to ask for help but here I felt comfortable enough to do so and I also wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing. The most important advice my mentor gave me was during our interview. We were speaking about the advice she had for me and she said to explore my interests which is something I really would like to do. She said not to decide on one thing so early in life because you might end up not liking it later on in life, explore a bunch of career paths and discover which one is for you.
Guy Miles' Release Day
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On Tuesday June 20, 2017 members from the California Innocence Project and I went up to Orange County to watch Guy Miles’ court hearing where the judge overturned his conviction and he was allowed to be free. We then went and sat outside of the jail they were transferring him over to. Around 11:00 PM Guy Miles walked out of that jail and into his new world of freedom after being incarcerated for 18 years.
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Here Is A Link To My Resume