Speakers

Margo Schlanger is the University of Michigan's Wade H. and Dores M. McCree Collegiate Professor of Law and the Director of the Civil Rights Litigation Clearinghouse. She is a leading authority on civil rights issues and civil and criminal detention, and she teaches constitutional law, torts, and classes relating to civil rights and to prisons. Professor Schlanger is the author of dozens of law review and other scholarly articles addressing criminal justice reform topics, and she is the lead author of the leading prisoner civil rights casebook, Incarceration and the Law (2020).  In addition to her research and writing, Professor Schlanger does substantial work in civil rights and prison and immigration reform, including serving as an expert in numerous cases addressing detention conditions. In 2010 and 2011, she served as the presidentially appointed Officer for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.  She also served on the Department of Homeland Security's Advisory Committee on Family Residential Centers, which recommended abolishing family detention.  She was the reporter for the American Bar Association’s revision of its Standards on the Treatment of Prisoners.

Jen Baker works for Disability Rights Michigan (DRM) where she is assigned to the Community and Institutional Rights (CAIR) division as the dedicated Investigator-Advocate for individuals with disability-related issues in Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC).  Much of Jen's knowledge base, as well as her commitment to prison reform, is guided by her previous work in MDOC, where she was a Corrections Officer for seven years.

Deborah LaBelle, is an attorney and writer whose work centers on constitutional and civil rights in class actions and community representation utilizing a human rights framework. Ms. Labelle’s advocacy focuses on the rights of children in the criminal justice and education systems in the United States; environmental justice claims; and challenges to racial disparity in public services. She has been lead counsel in over a dozen class actions that have successfully expanded the civil and constitutional rights of her clients in both federal and state courts including before the United States Supreme Court and in international forums.

In addition to her private practice, Ms. LaBelle is the Director of the Juvenile Life Without Parole Initiative for the ACLU of Michigan; Coordinator of Michigan’s Juvenile Mitigation Access Committee; and co-founder of the national Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth.

Ms. LaBelle has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the National Trial Lawyer of the Year Award from Public Justice Foundation; the Federal Bar Association Wade McCree Jr. Award; Michigan’s State Bar Champion of Justice Award; the National Lawyer Guild’s Law for the People Award; Criminal Defense Attorneys of Michigan Justice for All Award; the Integrity in the Community Award; Women Lawyers Association of Michigan Jean King Leadership Award; WAJ Outstanding Attorney Award; the Susan B. Anthony Award; the Martin Luther King “I Have a Dream” Award; the ACLU of Michigan Civil Libertarian of the Year Award; and the Beloved Community Award. Ms. LaBelle is a recipient of the Senior Soros Justice Fellowship, and a Ford Foundation Arts for Justice Fellow.

Larry is the owner of a small litigation law firm located in Ann Arbor, Michigan. As lead or co-counsel in dozens of civil and criminal trials, Larry focused his practice in the areas of criminal defense, civil rights, and defense of non-citizens (in deportation and/or post-conviction proceedings).  Larry has been recognized by the Georgia State Bar for his work in providing legal representation to low-income citizens of Georgia, and by the Atlanta City Council for his legal work in support of social justice with the Grady Coalition.  More recently, Larry's office successfully sued the State of Michigan on behalf of mentally ill persons unlawfully confined in the state's mental health system, after being found not guilty by reason of insanity (NGRI), which resulted in money damages to the Plaintiffs and a system-wide consent order. Today, Margolis & Cross represents prisoners and former prisoners in civil rights cases for deliberate indifference to serious medical needs, in violation of the 8th Amendment. One of Larry's clients, Joel Carter, will be accompanying Larry to the Summit. Mr. Carter is a former inmate in the MDOC who spent over 6 years in solitary confinement and suffered other systemic abuses for years.  Larry was appointed by a federal judge to represent Joel in his pro se civil rights lawsuit alleging violations of the Americans with Disability Act.  Mr. Carter was recently released after 22+ years when Larry successfully advocated to have a state court judge vacate one of Mr. Carter's 2002 convictions.  

Larry has testified in front of the state senate judiciary committee; he has been a past speaker or presenter at the University of Michigan undergraduate and law schools, and other legal events and seminars; and he is an ongoing chapter contributor to the Institute for Continuing Legal Education (ICLE), Collateral Consequences of Criminal Convictions. For more information about Larry's practice visit https://lawA2.com.

Lois Pullano is the Executive Director and Founder of Citizens for Prison Reform, a family-led nonprofit in 2012 after her 15-year-old son with mental illness was sentenced to the adult prison system in Michigan. Through a 2014 Soros Fellowship she worked within prisons to establish a Family Participation Program, connecting families to critical resources.  In 2015 she implemented a Family Advisory Board to Corrections. CPR’s work has focused on family inclusion and human dignity for all inside, as well as for their families. In 2019 CPR established an Open MI Door campaign to end solitary confinement in MI prisons, jails and juvenile detention facilities. CPR’s work is focused on culture shift, corrections oversight and ending the use of solitary confinement as well as family rights and connection during incarceration.

Jessica Zimbelman is a Managing Attorney with the State Appellate Defender Office, where she has worked since 2012. She has appeared before the Michigan Court of Appeals and Michigan Supreme Court multiple times, as well as trial courts throughout the state. Jessica was the attorney for Paul Betts, which led to the Michigan Supreme Court’s sweeping opinion declaring the 2011 Sex Offenders Registration Act (SORA) ex post facto punishment. In 2021, Jessica was awarded the Distinguished Brief Award from Cooley Law Review for her brief to the Michigan Supreme Court on behalf of Mr. Betts. Jessica looks forward to the day when people are not stigmatized and burdened by onerous registration obligations.

Jessica not only challenges the status quo through litigation, she also actively seeks to change the system through the legislative process. Prior to SADO, Jessica worked for two legislative agencies: as the Senior Analyst at the Legislative Corrections Ombudsman’s Office and as a legislative aide in the Michigan House of Representatives. She currently is Co-Chair of the Rules and Law Committee of the Criminal Defense Attorneys of Michigan and chairs SADO’s Court Rules and Legislation Committee. Jessica often testifies before the state legislature on pending legislation and offers public comment to the Michigan Supreme Court on pending court rule changes. She works hard to ensure the voices of the people we represent are heard as new laws and rules are adopted.

Jessica is the co-founder and co-chair of SADO’s Racial Justice Initiative-- a space dedicated to open dialogue about how race and racism operate within the walls of SADO and in the criminal legal system. Jessica strives to center equity and inclusion in all her work—in the courtroom, the office, and the world.